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REASONS 



FOR 

.REFUSING TO CONTINUE A MEMBER 

OF THE 

CHURCH OF EOME 

AND JOINING THE 

CHURCH OF ENGLAND, 

PRESSED TO HIS CHILDKEN ON BEMOYING THEM FROM THE 
^OM\N CATHOLIC PLACE OF WORSHIP AXD TAKING 
THEM TO THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND. 



BY FEANCJS DUVAL 



The same Lord over ail is rich unto all that call upon him. For Tvhosoever 
shall call upon the namt? of the Lord shall he saved."— Rom. x. 12, 13 



LONDON : 

HAMir.T^I.X. ADAMS, ^ Co., PATERNOSTER KOW- 
L,Pv : BALLE, HIGH STREET 

1846, 



The Library 
OF Cqngrbss ^ 



WASHINGTON ^>xA<2> 



EXETEIl : 

PSIKTED BY W. BALLE. HIGH STRBE-:,^ 



PEEFACE. 



T is with great diffidence that I bring before the public 
a book on so important a subject, which, in order to 

3 adequately treated in ail the parts which I have 

embraced, requires much more learning than I possess. 

I have not searched into the volumes of the Fathers, 

The quotations of their opinions I have made, are 

chiefly drawn from Bishop Jev/el's, and some other 

works ; Archbishop Usher, Mosheim, and Jewel, have 

been the chief authors I have consulted. I have culled 

from them, and from every author I have read an idea^ 

or a passage which 'appeared to me correct and fitted to 

illustrate the meaning which I wished to convey. I 

believe the quotations I have made from the Fathers are 

A 2 



iv. PREFACE, 

perfectly correct ; could it, however, be showed that they 
are not so, this would not weaken the ground I have 
taken upon doctrinal points, since I acknowledge 
Scripture as the only rule of faith, it is therefore by it 
alone that that which I advance is to be tested. 

The book was first written two years ago without any 
view to publication. It was intended for the perusal of 
my own children and private friends. A few friends^ 
whose opinion I value, having seen it, and approving of 
its general contents, I was induced to publish it ; not 
from the vain conceit that it is a superior work ; for, as 
has been remarked by some of my Roman Catholic 
friends, it is a worn-out and a stale subject, which has been 
handled on all its points by many men much more able 
than myself : but being a personal naiTative, I am led to 
hope that some persons, even Roman Catholics, may 
fee] inclined to peruse it, though they might not be 
inclined to read books on controversy written by able 
and learned men. This book was written for children, 
and it is published for plain and unlearned people, to 
whom deep reasoning and extensive research have no 
attraction, but who might yet take an interest in the 



PREFACE. V. 

simple narrative of a father addressing his children on a 
subject, v/hich, though it be stale to acute controversialists 
and learned priests, is nevertheless still new and of vital 
importance to the bulk of mankind. 

I have introduced the subject by a short V'iew of the 
existence of God, and the consideration of a few of 
the principal arguments which are used against the 
truth of revelation, in the same manner as divinity is 
taught in my country, and on the continent by 
professors of theology, who take nothing for granted, 
and begin their instruction by proving the existence of 
God, &c. 

I w^as advised by a friend, whose knowledge of 
Scripture and sound judgment I highly esteem, though 
he is only a layman, to cut off this introductory part 
in my publication, because he said it was not exactly in 
point, and persons who might read the book would be 
anxious to come at once to the main subject, namely, my 
reasons for refusing to remain a member of the Church 
of Rome. Upon consideration I found I could not 
comply with his advice, without re-modelling a great 
part of the work, which I had not time to do. 



VU PREFACE, 

I have cut off what could be left out without breakmg 
the link of the narrative. I hope those Christians who 
will take the trouble of reading this little treatise, will 
pardon me for intruding that which they may consider 
superfluous. If they will be pleased to remember the 
objections which I attempt to refute are very prevalent, 
both in England and on the continent, the thought 
that it is possible that the book may fall into the hands 
of some one who is biassed by those false opinions, and 
who may be induced to see the futility of them, will be 
I trust, a sufficient apology, for my not complying 
with my friend's suggestion. 



CONTENTS. 



INTRODUCTION. 

Various expounders of Truth — The Word of God alone, Truth 
to a Christian — Refusal to remain a Member of the Church of 
Rome — No Change of Religion — Inducement to Join the 
Chm-ch of England — Not merely because she is a Branch of 
the Catholic Church — Christ the End of the Law — Infallibility 
— Private Judgment — Authority of Scripture — Transubstaii- 
tiation — Intercession of Saints — Invocation of Saints — One 
Degi*ee of Worship — Images — EiTors of the Church of Rome 
— Ministers — The Words of Jeremiah — St. John — Aaron — 
Uriah — Doubts — True Principle of the Gospel— Reasons for 
Joining the Church of England — Unity — Principles of the 
Church of England — Reformation of the Jewish Church — 
Reformation of the Church of England — The Lawful Suc- 
cession of her Ministers — Her Worship — Christian Liberty— 
The Church of England, the Bulwark of the Reformed 
Faith 7 



CHAPTER I. 

False Charges against Seceders from the Church of Rome — 
The Love of Truth — Embracing a Pure Mode of Worship by 
Joining the Church of England 21 



CONTENTS- 



CHAPTER 11. 

PAGE. 

Existence of God-— Man — His Dependence on God—- Import 
ance of True Notions of God— Man's Intellect— Clear Idea 
about God— Consentient Testimony of Men — Nature — Fate 
— A Power Independent of Matter — Necessity of a Revelation 
—-Man's Creation — His Faculties— Obedience to the Law of 
God — Man's Disobedience — Promise of a Saviour — The 
Destruction of Mankind — Types of Christ and his Church — 
Ciiinese Records of the Flood— Call of Abraham — History 
of the Jews, Typical of Christ and his Church— Revelation- 
Its Objectors — Nature of Religion — Importance of Written 
Documents — The Books of Moses — Their Authenticity — 
M. Champollion Figeac's Description — The People" of 
God 24 



CHAPTER III. 

Existence of Christ — Interpolation in the History of Joseph us 
—The Gospels — The Apostles— Studied Silence of Josephus 
—False Gosj)els — Eastern Philosophers — Image of the Virgin 
—Chapel of Loreto— The Gnostics — Proofs of the Divinity 
and Humanity of Christ, taken from the Gnostics — Use of 
Images— Consent of the Jews— Their Tradition about Jesus 
Christ — Duty of a Christian — Sacrifice of our Reason — 
Natural Phenomena — Deception of the Senses 36 



CHAPTER IV. 

Trinity — Ground of our Belief — Tri-une Power in Man — 
Distinct Set of Faculties — One Mind — Saying of Plutarch — 
Not Applicable to the First Man — Words of Jesus Christ. . . . 46 



CHAPTER V. 

Jesus Christ the Redeemer and only Mediator— New Cove- 
nant — New Conditions — ^Preaching of the Apostles — The 
Catholic Church— Propagation of the Gospel — Early Divi- 
sions — Heresy — Christian Doctrine in the Bible alone — New 
Testament not written by mere Chance — Tradition to be 
Rejected — Mission of the Apostles— View of the Early 
Church — Rapid Spread of Christianity— Pliny's Letter to 
Trajan . . , , 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER VI. 

p. 

Difficulty of Tracing the Rise of any Superstition — Worship of 
Saints — Not Known to the First Christians — Early Traces of 
that Superstition— Relics — Influence of the Imagination— 
Prmce Hohenlohe — Dr. Paris — Female Devotees — Mesmer- 
ism — Estatica di Caldero— Dr. Elliotson's Remark— Shrines 
of Martyrs— Belief in the Influence of Relics — Latria — 
Dulia — Hyperdulia — Heroes and Demi-gods — Pilgrimages — 
Passion for ReUcs 

CHAPTER VII. 

Introduction of Abuses Accounted for— Gregory Thaumatur- 
gus — Mart3'rs put in the Place of Demi-gods — Corruption of 
Christianity — The Idea of Intercession of Saints whence 
Taken — Images Really Worshipped — Arguments of Idola- 
ters — Plea for Modern Image — Worship— Captious Excuses 
— Decree of the Council of Trent — Praying to Saints Obliga- 
tory — Worship of Saints Kept in the Back Ground in 
England — The Jesuits— Litany of the Virgin 

CHAPTER VIII. 

Existence after Death — Transitory State — Purgatory — Judas 
Maccabaeus-Apocrypha— Belief of the Jews about Purga- 
tory — Canonical Books — Jerome's Statement — Motives of 
the Council of Trent — Silence of Jesus Christ concerning 
Purgatory — Doctrine Taught by Jesus Christ — Doctrine of 
the Heathen — Funeral Rites — Tapers — Feast of the Purifi- 
cation — Doctrine of the Apostles — St. Peter— St. Paul — 
Belief of the Early Chiistians — Gradual Introduction of the 
Belief in Purgatory — Funeral Rites of the Early Christians — 
Macrobius— Pra^'ers for the Dead — No Reference to Pui'ga- 
tory — Reference to the Resurrection — Eastern Churches — 
Expiatory Sacrifices— Christ's Sacrifice for Sin — Super- 
abundance of the Merits of Saints — Their Application — No 
Merits in Men 



CHAPTER IX. 

Frequent Apostacy in the Early Church — Means to Check 
it— Public Penances — Their Relaxation— Their Effects — 
Their Uselessness — Origin of the Doctrine of Good Works — 
Indulgences — Means of gaining an Indulgence— Superstition 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER X. 

PAGE, 

Free Grace — The Reformed Churches — The Roman Church— 
St. James — Dead Faith — Works the Evidence of Faith — 
Abraham's Obedience — The Word of God the Protestants' 
Rule of Faith— Merit of Good Works Taught by the Roman 
Church — Errors arising from this Doctrine — Ascetic Life — 
All Eastern Nations addicted to it — Uselessness of Ascetism 
— Jerome's Testimony — Effect of Periodical Fasting — 
Souring of the Temper— Jerome's Violent Temper — Want 
of Genuine Christianity — Mistaken Admiration— False 
Miracles — Image of the Zodiacal Virgin — Worship of Men — 
Worship of the Virgin— Mary Substituted for Cybele — 
Supreme Worship paid to Mary 110 



CHAPTER XI. 

Tendency to Materialize — Its Effect — Figurative Language — 
Christ's Discourse to the Jews — Meat to Everlasting Life — 
The Bread of Life— The Bread from Heaven— The Divinity 
of Christ — Christ's Body Sacrificed for Sin— Christ our Food- 
Spiritual Purport of his Words — Christ's Answer to Nico- 
demus — Material Figure — Spiritual Doctrine 128 



CHAPTER XII. 

The Lord's Supper— -Custom of Sacrifices— Feast upon the 
Sacrifice — The Moment of the Institution of the Eucharist — 
The Passover — The Words of the Institution — Spiritual Inter- 
pretation — Its Efiects — Material Interpretation — Its Results 
— Christ the Paschal Lamb — The New Covenant — Union with 
' Christ— The Blood of the New Testament— The Fruit of the 
Vine— Christ's Discourse to the Jews, not immediately 
applicable to the Eucharist— Baptism — Regeneration — 
Benefits of the Sacrifice — The Idea of a New Sacrifice — 
Effect of this New Tenet — Its Evil Consequence — The 
Elements Worshipped as God . . . , , . , , 138 



CHAPTER XIII. 

Scriptures the only Proper Rule of Faith — Value of the Testi- 
mony of the Fathers— Ambiguity of the Fathers — Explanation 
of the Eucharist — Spiritual Meaning — St. Augustine's Dis- 
tinction—Time and Place— Nature of the Sacrament — The 
Bread and Wine the Sign of an Inward Grace— Gradual 
Worship of the Elements— Pagan Ritual , » \65 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

PAGE, 

Reverence first showed to the Bread and Wine— Worship of 
the Type — Opinions long Divided about the Real Presence- 
Innocent III. — Excommimication — Plenary Indulgence — 
Albigenses — Crusade— -Early Protestants — Inquisition — 
Fourth Lateran Council — Transubstantiation — Canon of the 
Mass — Spiritual Union vsrith Christ — No other Possible — 
Evil of the Tenet of Transubstantiation — Intention Required 
in the Priest — Caution to Roman Catholics — Anathema — 
Pagan Ritual — Pagan Origin of the Mass — The Use of Salt — 
Holy Water — Driving a^Yay of the Evil Spirits — Sign of the 
Cross — Salt Used at Baptism — Use of Spittle — Baptism of 
Bells 163 



CHAPTER XV. 

The Five additional Sacraments — Confinnation — A part of the 
Baptismal Rite — Why vested in the Bishop — Holy Chrism 
— Order — Marriage — Abuse of the Word Sacrament a in — 
Marriage of Priests — Penance and Confession — Repentance 
— Salvation — Penance as taught by the Church of Rome — 
Contrary to Scripture — Founded on the Doctrine of Merit in 
Works and Mortifications — Its Eff'ects — The Priest practi- 
cally put in the Place of Christ— Confessi on taughtin Scripture 
— Remission of Sins— How understood by the Apostles — 
Mistaken Supposition — Origin of Private Confession — Abso- 
lution, Origurally Deprecatory, not Declai'atory — Extreme 
Unction — Its Nature and EiFects — The Use of Oil — Mistaken 
means of Salvation — Milner's Unfounded Boasting — False 
Confidence — Fetichism — Hindoo Fanatic 175 



CHAPTER XVI. 

Fasting and Abstinence — Fasting not Necessary— Not com- 
manded by Christ — Not Condemned— Fasting of early 
Heretics— Tertullian— Fasting first Voluntary, afterwards 
commanded as an Atonement — Christian Liberty — False 
Ideas about Fasting — Fasts in the Church of England— All 
to the Glory of God 193 



CHAPTER XVII. 

The Church— What is the Church— The Catholic Church- 
Private Churches —Original Independence of Churches- 
Bishops and Presbyters — The x4postlcs not Local Bishops-^ 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE. 

The whole Church Directed by them— Origin of the Order 
of Bishops — A Bishop over one Church— No Supreme Bishop 
— Provincial Councils — Rise of the Episcopal Power — Me- 
tropolitans — General Councils — Patriarchs 201 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

Development of the Church — The Bishop of Rome — His 
Advantages — His Pre-eminence, the result of his Position — 
Government of the Church regulated by Constantine — 
Equality of Patriarchs — Pretensions of the Patriarch of Con- 
stantinople — Justinian's Letter — Universal Bishop — The 
Title given to the Bishop of Rome — Disputes between the 
Bishops of Rome and of Constantinople — Sovereign Pontiff — 
St. Peter — His Presence in Rome — His Twenty-five Years' 
Pontificate — Doubtful whether he ever was in Rome— Never 
was Bishop of Rome — Testimony of Irenaeus and Eusebius — 
Peter not the Head of the Church — The Rock, Faith in 
Christ, not Peter — Holding of the Keys — Peter the Founder 
of the Church — Dispute among the Apostles— The words of 
Christ to Peter— Peter Rebuked by Christ— No Master but 
Christ— Equality of the Apostles— Equality of Bishops— The 
Pope's Pretensions defeated by Peter's own Words— Causes 
of the Pope's Supremacy— Encroachment of Power— Incon- 
sistency of placing Councils above the Pope— Power of 
Councils— Whence Derived— Council of Nice— Factions in 
Councils— Councils nothing more than Political Assemblies. 213 



CHAPTER XIX. 

Gradual growth of Abuses— Mixture of Jewish and Pagan Rites 
— Tombs Converted into Altars— Mementos in Temples and 
Chapels— Devotions at the Shrines of Saints — Romanism in 
England — Difference between those who reject and those who 
admit the present Superstitions— The Church in the Fourth 
Century— Ambrose — Pretended Miracles — Sulpicius Severus 
— Popular Superstitions — St. Augustine's Relics — The Op- 
ponents of Superstition always Accused of Heresy — Vigi- 
lantius' Attemx^t to Stem the Torrent of Superstition — Not 
Accused of Perverting the Gospel — Virulently Attacked by 
Jerome — The mode of Worship at present Prevailing in the 
Church of Rome — Its Rise — Not fully developed in the time of 
Jerome and Augustine — Inconsiderate demand in Excuse of 
Abuses — Opinions gradually Formed — The Hindoos — Res- 
pect turned into Worship — Worship paid to Symbols — The 
Egyptians — Effects of Ambition in the Clergy — Gradual 



CONTENTS. 



Worship of the Elements in the Eucharist — The Emperor 
Charles the Bald — Bertramn — True Orthodox Doctrine — 
Taught by the Church of England in her Articles — The 
Christians after the Apostles, and their immediate Disciples 
like the Israelites after the Death of Joshua , '^1 



CHAPTER XX. 

The Cross— Great Distribution— Vv^orship of the Cross— Use of 
the Latin Language— Plea for the Use of it— An Universal 
Church— No Real Unity in the Church of Rome — Encyclical 
Letter of Gregory XVI, against Toleration— Application of 
his Words— The Grand Lama— Division among Protestants— 
The Reformed Church not answerable for Excesses— Duty of 
Union— Real Members of the Catholic Church— Faith in Christ 
Real Union— Christ's answer to John— St. Paul— Means Used 
by the Roman Clergy to Enforce Union— The Bible— The 
Vulgate— Its Imperfections— The Council of Trent— The Bible 
little Read — Not known in Roman Catholic Countries— Books 
Preferred to the Bible— "The Glories of Mary," by A. 
Liguori— Influence of Early Impressions— Error of Un- 
believers—Their False Reasoning— Superstition the Cause 
of Unbelief— Importance of Church History— Gradual De-^ 
parture from the first principle of Christianity— New 
Intercessors — Salvation by Faith set aside— Influence of 
Bishops— Rise of the Papal Power— Traffic in Indulgences- 
Abuses Continued— Salvation — Faith and by Works — 
Salvation Sought from the Clergy— Invocation of Saints 
Commanded— Delusions arising from that Worship—Causes 
of Conversion to Romanism— True Principles to be Followed 
— Conclusions which every unprejudiced Roman Catholic 
must come to — Boast of Roman Catholics — Illusions con- 
cerning the Fathers — Invocation of Invisible Beings- 
Violation of the First Commandment — A Grievous Offence 
against God — No Sacrifice in the Mass — Purgatory and 
Indulgences — A New Law of Man's Invention — Uselessness 
of Works of Supererogation — Duty and Liberty of Christians 
—The Children of God— Christ the only Head of the Church 
—The Pope not the Head of the Church— The Church of 
Rome not Infallible — The true mode of Venerating the 
Saints— Tmst ha Christ 263 



INTKODUCTION. 



" Be ready always to give, an answer to everj^ man that asketk 
-y'ou a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear, 
1 Peter hi. 15, 



What is truth ? is a question which all men ask, and 
which all men pretend to solve. The bulk of mankind 
remain satisfied with seeing the truth in those systems, 
those traiitions, which have been handed down to them 
by their fathers, and adhere to them with a deep-rooted 
pertinacity. Others, seeing the follies and errors, to 
which mei in all ages and countries have been addicted, 
place the truth in the denial of all received opinions, 
and propound to us the fancies of their own minds as 
the only truths which they pretend are founded upon 
nature, ani as new and important discoveries, which are 
to regenente the world. Others tell us, that they are 



Vlllc 



INTRODUCTION. 



the depositories of truth, it is to them that it has 
been committed, therefore it is in them alone that it 
resides ; and if we refuse to receive it from them, we 
fall into lamentable errors and are lost for ever. But 
a Christian, vv^hose understanding and conscience have 
been impressed with the truth of these words — The 
natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of 
God : for they are foolishness unto him ; neither can 
he know them, because they are spiritually discerned," 
acknowledges the perfect agreement of these words with 
the workings of his own mind and heart ; they discover 
to him the secret causes of all moral evil ; they unravel 
to him the history of man. 

Then the necessity of a revelation appears to him as 
evident as the existence of man himself, and he exclaims; 
" O God, teach me thy truth ! Thy word is truth ! " 
The word of God is then necessarily his only rule of 
faith : and, as stated in the 20th article of the Church 
of England, he feels it his duty to reject whatever is 
enforced upon his belief, which is contrary to Scripture, 
or is not sanctioned by it. Impressed with this truth, 
I refuse to remain a member of the Church of Rome, 
or indeed of any Church, which enforces upon my belief 
doctrines which I know to be false, to be iajurious to 
God's honour, and detrimental to man's best interest 
and eternal welfare. I 

But in doing this, have I changed religidi ? have I 



INTRODUCTION. 



embraced another faith ? In acknowledging that other 
foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is 
Jesus Christ/' — do I cease to be a Christian ? Undoubt- 
edly not. Having been brought up in the bosom of a 
Church which has built ujDon this foundation^ wood, 
hay, stubble/' it was my duty as a thinking being to 
try with the touch- stone of truth, the word of God, that 
system of human invention. I reject what is of man, 
and receive with faith and thankfulness what is of God. 
I firmly believe that in the midst of many doubts and 
perplexities it has pleased God to enlighten me and to 
lead me to the knovdedge of truth as it is in Jesus ; and 
I am not ashamed thus publicly to declare it. With 
me then it is entirely a question of truth and of error, 
and not at all of ministerial jurisdiction. I was a mem- 
ber of the Gallican Church; but I did not join the 
Church of England merely because she is a branch of 
the Catholic Church, and because living in England I 
am naturally under her jurisdiction ; so that in France 
I ought to attend the Gallican Church, and in England 
the Anglican Church. Such an idea could never enter 
into the head of a Roman Catholic ; and so long as he 
believes that the Church of which the Pope is the head, 
is the only true Church, out of which there is no salva- 
tion, he will never commit the mistake of attending a 
Protestant Church instead of a Roman Catholic Chapel ; 
and should he go to Ireland, where the two hierarchies 



INTRODUCTION. 



subsist side by side, be will never dream of placing 
himself under the jurisdiction of tbe Protestant Arch- 
bishop of Dublin, for instance, because he is the 
Archbishop of that see by law, instead of that of the 
Eoman Archbishop. No, it is not thus that a Roman 
Catholic reasons. So long as he believes that the clergy 
are the depositories of truth, and that v/ithout the 
apostolic succession of priests and bishops there is no 
true Church, he will also believe that the external or 
visible Church, represented by those priests and bishops 
cannot err, that all those who have gone out of her, 
have rejected the legitimate authority committed by 
Christ to his apostles, and he will receive with reverence 
and submission whatever that Church imposes upon his 
belief. But the moment that by the grace of the Spirit 
of God the light of the Gospel has shone upon his mind 
and convinced him of this truth, that Christ is the end 
of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth, 
(Rom. X. 4.) and that we are justified freely by the 
grace of God through the redemption that is in Christ 
Jesus — (Rom. iii. 24,) every doubt and uncertainty 
vanishes ; he ceases to look up to m.an for his salvation, 
he flies to Christ as his only Mediator and Intercessor, 
and with a heart- felt dependence upon God's mercy and 
forgiveness, he exclaims, whom have I in heaven but 
thee, and there is none upon earth that I desire beside 
thee" — (Psalm Ixxiii. 25.) 



INTRODUCTION. 



xi. 



Then the infallibility, which had been a stumbling 
block to him, because it was claimed by men, v/ho, he 
knew, had enforced upon his belief doctrines, which his 
understanding showed him to be false, and to be the 
remnant or the off- shoot of antiquated errors, appears to 
him in its true light. He sees that infallibility only in 
the Gospel of Christ, which is the power of God unto 
salvation to every one that believeth" — (Rom. i. 16.) He 
becomes convinced that in course of time both teachers 
and people have fallen into those errors, because they 
have misconstrued some passages of the Gospel, or have 
added to it the suggestions of their ow^n judgment or 
fancy, notwithstanding this expressed declaration of the 
inspired writer : Though we, or an angel from heaven, 
preach any other gospel than that which we have 
preached, let him be accursed''— (Gal. i. 8.) 

But it will be said, this is private judgment : what 
right has an obscure individual to set up his own 
judgment against the testimony of the Church P I 
answer that faith being an exclusive dependence of man 
upon God, he alone can be a Christian who believes 
wdth implicit faith in these words of our Saviour. — " As 
Moses lifted the Serpent in the wilderness, so must 
the Son of man be lifted up : that whosoever believeth 
in him should not perish, but have eternal life" — (John 
iii, 14, 15.) Then he looks up to Christ alone for his 
reconciliation with God, and it is his duty to weigh and 



xll. 



INTRODUCTION. 



examine whatever is proposed to him by man, as a 
means of salvation. 

Besides, does not the Gospel address itself to the 
private judgment of every man ? Believe not every 
Spirit, but tiy the Spirits whether they are of God, 
because many false prophets are gone out into the 
world — (1 John iv. 1.) — Prove all things : hold fast 
that which is good" — (1 Thes. v. 21.) — We have no 
dominion over your faith, but are helpers of your joy : 
for by faith you stand" — (2 Cor. i. 24.) Again, did not 
St. Peter appeal to the private judgment of every one 
of his hearers, when, in his discourse to the assembled 
Jews, he brought forward arguments from Scripture to 
prove, that God had made that same Jesus whom they 
had crucified both Lord and Christ ? — (Actsii. 36.) It 
is by right of private judgment alone that the Church of 
England at the Reformation cut off those things 

contrary to God's word written," which, together with 
other Churches, she had taught and maintained for 
many centuries. 

Nay, the members of the Church of Rome itself 
follow their private judgment in all the reasonings they 
use in support of the particular doctrines which their 
Church teaches, and they apply themselves exclusively 
to convince the private judgment of others. Is there a 
single individual among all the Roman priesthood who 
will not attempt to prove by argument the truth of those 



INTRODUCTION. 



Xlll. 



dogmas and doctrines which he holds^ or who will remain 
content to say^ " It is so ordered by the Church ?" 
What is this hut mere private judgment P Were not 
the decisions of councils the result of private judgment ? 
Tradition is the fruit and abuse of private judgment. 

That authority, which the Church of Rome claims to 
itself, belongs to Scripture alone. It is because men 
have assumed this authority, that so many errors, so 
many abuses, so many divisions have always existed. 

I reject transubstantiation, because I am fully 
persuaded that the wafer remains bread after consecration, 
as it was before. I believe, that the bread in the 
Eucharist is the communion of the body of Christ, but 
is not the body itself. Though it were possible that a 
change of substance could take place, it could be only 
the body of Christ as a dead victim, and not his body, 
soul, and divinity, as is taught by the Church of Rome. 
Therefore, to attend mass and worship the host, with 
my present conviction, would be on my part a sheer act 
of idolatry. 

I believe that the worship of saints is contrary to 
Scripture, and an offence against God, '^who only knows 
the hearts of all the children of men" — ( 1 Kings viii. 39.) 

The doctrine of the intercession of saints, which 
crept into the Church previously to that of their 
invocation, is contrary to Scripture ; for in it we are 
told, that There is one God, and one Mediator between 



xiv. 



INTRODUCTION. 



God and man^ tlie man Christ Jesus" — ( 1 Tim. ii. 6.)— 
Neither is there sanation in any other [but Christ] ; 
for there is none other name under the heaven given 
among men vv^herehy we must be saved" — (Acts iv. 12.) 

The invocation of saints^ which was introduced 
afterwards, is a new system of polytheism. I refuse to 
remain a member of a Church, which imposes upon me 
a worship expressly forbidden by God, who declares, 
that he is the Lord, and there is no one else-— (Isaiah 
xiv. ) that lie is a jealous God, and he will not give his glory 
to another. It is vain to attempt to excuse the w^orship 
of saints, &c., by saying that a minor worship is paid 
to them. The law of God, and the constitution of the 
human mind, do not admit of such a distinction. The 
being, to which we address our prayers, is our only 
God whilst we pray to it. If we are really moved in 
our adoration, we cannot think of any other, but the 
saint or angel to whom v/e pray, because the act of 
praying being a feeling, it commands all the faculties of 
the mind, when it is more than mere lip worship. In 
those general forms of prayer,, in which God is associated 
with the virgin, saints, and angels, the name of God 
does not excite a higher feeling of adoration, than that 
of the saints. All depends upon the state of the mind, 
or the particular devotion of the supplicant. There can 
be but one degree of worship ; the human mind does 
not admit of more. That decree of the second Council 



INTRODUCTION. 



of Nice, which ordered that the same veneration should 
he paid to an image, as to the heing which it represented^ 
w^as in perfect conformity with that law of nature, that 
veneration is a single act of the mind, and cannot he 
divided. So he who prays before an image, in looking 
to it, really prays to that image. If he has been 
strongly moved, the image has remained impressed upon 
his mind, and he represents to himself for a long period 
afterwards the heing, whom he wished to invoke under 
the form of that image, and he converses with him 
through that image. It is for this reason that men, who 
like to figure to themselves the Deity under a tangible 
form, have always been so fond of images, and have 
held them in so great a veneration. 

The Church of Rome has fallen into lamentable 
errors and grievous heresies, if heresy be false doctrine, 
notwithstanding the regular succession of bishops of 
which it boasts. It has departed from truth as the 
Churches of Asia had already done in the time, 
when St. John wrote the book of Revelation, though 
no doubt they had a much purer and more apostolic 
succession of pastors than that which the Roman 
Church now can have after so many divisions and 
contests between popes and anti-popes. "It is 
vain then for its priesthood to preach themselves" — 
(2 Cor. iv. 5,) "' and set themselves up as the only true 
ministers of God ; for, though there must be ministers 



xvi. INTRODUCTION. 

of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God, it is 
required in stewards that a man be found faithful — 
(1 Cor. iv. 2.) If they be not faithful, they are 
no longer the ministers of truth, but they are the 
ministers of error. They are no more to be followed 
than the prophets, concerning whom the Lord saith b}" 
the mouth of Jeremiah : Hearken not unto the words 
of the prophets that prophesy unto you : they make you 
vain : they speak a vision of their own heart, and^'not 
out of the mouth of the Lord'' — (Jerem. xxiii. 16.) As 
St. John says — " If there come any unto you, and bring- 
not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, 
neither bid him God speed" — (2 John, 10.) Their 
worship is to be rejected as was that of Aaron, when he 
built an altar before the golden calf — (Exodus xxvii. 5,) 
or that of the high priest Uriah, who built an altar 
in the temple according to the pattern, which King Ahaz 
had sent to him from Damascus — (2 Kings xvi. IL) 

After many doubts and perplexities suggested to me 
by the palpable errors of that Church which I had been 
taught to consider as infallible, out of whose bosom it 
was impossible to please God, I was brought at last, as 
I firmly believe, through the mercy of God, to a practical 
knowledge of these words — " By grace are ye saved 
through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of 
God, not of works, lest any man should boast" — (Ephes, 
ii. 8.) Then all doubts vanished; for if it is not of m.y 



INTRODUCTION. 



XV 11. 



own works that I am saved, d fortiori, it is not of other 
men. It is the grace of the Holy Spirit alone, which can 
regenerate the heart of man ; it is because I had looked 
on men as mediators between me and God, as the 
channels, through which that grace was to be imparted, 
that I had not understood this great truth. Then I felt 
an inward conviction that the word of God stood alone, 
free from the pollutions of human fancy and extrava- 
gance, and was not at all chargeable for those additions, 
which had been made to it, or those follies and 
animosities, which have characterised so many professing 
Christians in all ages. 

Then to join a body of Christians had become to me 
a want and a duty. The principle of salvation through 
faith alone, which I feel convinced to be the true 
principle of the Gospel, is the only one which can 
induce a Roman Catholic, who is a sincere inquirer after 
truth, to leave his Church. For the doctrine and 
authority of the Church are inseparable, and he who 
believes the doctrine of the Church of Rome to be true, 
will easily acquiesce in her authority. It is for this 
reason that so many clergymen of the Church of 
England, who have taken the works, and practices of 
the writers of the fourth, fifth, sixth, and subsequent 
centuries for their guides, instead of the Scriptures, and 
have explained by the new doctrine development, those 
corruptions and errors, the germs of which are to be 

B 



XVUl. 



INTRODUCTION, 



traced to those former ages, have recently jomed the 
Church of Rome. They also^ hy doing this, are instances 
of the use of private judgment. They first helieved 
in the doctrines and tenets of that Church, and then 
they admitted her authority. For whoever is guided hy 
tradition and man's authority, (in the west at least,) will 
unite himself to the Church of Rome ; hut he who 
takes Scripture for his rule, will leave it. 

With the belief firmly impressed upon my mindj 
that salvation is by faith alone, and not by men v/ho are 
all liable to error, T had to make a choice out of the 
numerous bodies, into which Christianity is outwardly 
divided. I felt 1 could not conscientiously join any^ 
but the Church of England. Unity is a duty which is 
enjoined upon us by our Saviour, and by all the inspired- 
writers. It is not only unity of belief, but also of fellow- 
ship and of our assembling together. The Church of 
England at the Reformation cut ofif those errors, which 
I reject. She professedly declares that Holy Scripture 
contains all things necessary to salvation ; so that what- 
soever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, 
is not to be required of any man, that it should be 
believed as an article of faith, or be thought requisite or 
necessary to salvation — (sixth article.) 

As in primitive times. Churches were founded in 
different localities, were first united together by common 
faith and Christian fellowship, and at last formed a body 
of laws for the discipline of all the Churches of the 



INTRODUCTION. 



xix. 



same province, so the Church of England is the natural 
expansion of Christianity in this country. 

Moreover, as at the reformation of the Jewish Church 
under King Hezekiah, (2 Chron. xxxi.) all Israel went 
oRt to the cities of Judah, brake the images in pieces, 
and threw down the high places and altars, until they 
had utterly destroyed them, and afterwards Hezekiah 
appointed the courses of the priests and Levites, 
according to the law of Moses, so at the Reformation 
the Church of England — in breaking the images and 
abolishing the worship, which was not according to the 
Word of God, — wisely preserved the different orders of 
ministers, which had subsisted in the Church from the 
earliest times. She is as much a continuation of the 
Catholic Church in this country, as the Reformed Church 
under Hesekiah was a continuation of the Jewish Church, 
She has, therefore, as lawful and as regular a succession 
of ministers as any church can boast of. She re-esta- 
blished the independence, which the old British Church 
had enjoyed, and which was the state of all Churches 
before, by a series of encroachments and circumstances 
favourable to their pretensions, the Bishops of Rome 
brought all the Western Churches under their 
jurisdiction. 

Being in England, and believing that nothing but 
the enforcing of false doctrines upon our belief can 
oblige us to separate and form distinct assemblies^ I 

B 2 



INTRODUCTION. 



could not but join the Church of England. Her forms 
of prayers and mode of worship are primitive, pure, and 
simple. Though I should have no objection to subscribe 
to her articles, yet I am not required to do so. All, 
that is asked of me, is only that bond of common 
union between Christians, namely, faith in Christ, 
as the Saviour and Redeemer of the world, Who, 
being in the form of God, thought it not robbery 
to be equal with God :" " And being found in fashion 
as a man, became obedient unto death, even the death 
of the cross" — (Phil. ii. 6, 8.) Independently of 
my firm belief in the necessity of outward unity, I 
find that it is in conjunction with the Church of England, 
that I am the least subjected to man's name or authority, 
and that I can best stand in that liberty wherewith 
Christ hath made us free. She is the bulwark of the 
reformed faith, of pure evangelical religion. May she 
never forget her call ! God has made England powerful 
among the nations of the earth. May her Church be 
an instrument in his hand to carry the light of the 
Gospel to all the people submitted to her empire ! 
May that Church continue to be built upon the 
foundation of the prophets and apostles, Jesus Christ 
himself being the chief corner-stone. 

After these preliminary remarks, which I thought to 
be required of me, since I venture to appear before the 
public, I pass to my address, such as it was originally 
written for the use of my children. 



CHAPTEK 1. 



" If ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye." 

1 Peter iv. 14 



Exeter, June 14th, 1844. 

My dear Children, 

At length the day is come, when I can 
find sufficient time and leisure, to collect my thoughts, 
in order to address you upon the most important subject, 
which can engage the pen of a father, in his solicitude 
for the welfare of those beings, whom it has pleased 
Providence to commit to his charge, and whom he is 
bound to maintain and direct in the path of virtue, 
religion, and happiness. I mean to speak to you of 
God, and of man's salvation through faith in Christ, 
who brought life and immortality to light, that of all 



22 



FALSE IMPUTATION. 



those who believe on hhn none should perish, but have 
everlasting life. 

I feel myself bound to account to you for the 
important step which I have taken at the beginning of 
this year. Though you are probably still too young to 
understand fully the reasons, which have induced me to 
it, yet I trust I shall be able to shew you that my 
motives for leaving the religious society, in whose com- 
munion you and I were brought up, and bringing you 
over with me to the Church, established in this country 
under the name of the Church of England, did not 
arise from levity of thought, or from indifference to 
your and my eternal welfare. 

I am well aware, indeed, that the members of the 
Church of Rome, in the credulity, which shuts their 
eyes upon the manifold abuses, with which the practice 
of their Church abounds, and in the confidence which a 
secure reliance on the infallibility of their opinions 
produces, are in the habit of looking upon every seceder 
from their body as a back-slider, who, for some un- 
worthy motive, wilfully turns his eyes from truth, and 
acts against his conscience. 

Undismayed, however, by such ungrounded accusa- 
tions, rather pitying the narrow prejudice, which dictates 
them, than complaining of them, I have left that Church 
for ever. 

Though I was long in suspense, I never was indifferent. 



LOVE OF TRUTH. 



23 



Truth, sacred truth, was the end of all my desires, the 
object of all my doubts and all my inquiries. At last, 
as I feel fally persuaded, it has pleased God to enlighten 
my understanding, and to show me the truth as it is in 
€hrist Jesus ; I shrink not from avowing my conviction : 
I most solemnly declare that the love of truth has been 
my only motive. Having once embraced a purer mode 
of worship, which I considered founded upon the truth 
of the Gospel, I felt it my bounden duty to remove you 
from error, and to bring you to a Church where the pure 
word of G od is preached, and in which His only Son, 
Jesus Christ, is acknowledged and invoked as the only 
Mediator for man's transgressions, without any mixture 
of that creature worship and that materializing spirit, 
with which so many branches of the Christian Church 
have been defiled for many ages past. 

But mere assertions are not, and ought not to be 
sufficient. Therefore I purpose to develope to you 
the course thai I have followed in my inquiries, the 
evidence that I have studied, the reasonings that 
I have pursued, and the conclusions to which I 
have come. I feel that the task which I undertake is a 
sub[ject of vast extent ; brit I must endeavour to con- 
dense it as much as possible, reserving, perhaps, to a 
later period, should it please God to grant me life and 
health, as well as sufficient abilities, to enlarge ispon 
those parts, which I shall merely touch at present. 



CHAPTEE 11. 



" He that cometb to God must believe that he is, and that he is 
& rewarder of them that diligently seek him." Hebrews xi. 6. 



There is a God. By God is meant a spirit, independent 
of matter, pervading all the universe. Every thing that 
we see, every thing that we feel, proclaims his existence, 
the power of his will, the infinity of his knowledge, and 
the wisdom of his works. 

The magnitude of the stars and planets, their order 
and arrangement down to the formation of the smallest 
animal, that creeps upon the earth, all equally announce 
his providence and government. In all we see not only 
adaptation, but perfect design. We need not borrow an 
analogy of that design from the work of man, because 
God's works are very dissimilar from man's works, and 



EXISTENCE OF GOD. 



25 



the means he employs^ are all that which we understand 
by natural laivs. Although we cannot understand how 
those means are put in operation, yet we are able to 
trace a most conspicuous design, not only in the arrange- 
ment of individual beings, but in all the relations which 
they bear to the whole, as well as to the other individual 
beings, by which they are surrounded, and in the midst 
of which they are designed to move and to act. 

But as man has been truly said to be the microcosm 
of the great whole, it is especially in him, that we can 
clearly trace the evidence of benevolent design, and 
omnipotent power. Of all animals that move upon 
the earth, he was created the last : both revelation and 
science combine to establish this important fact. He 
was designed to have the command of the whole creation : 
he received powers, which could enable him to obtain 
that end. He was made after the image of his Creator : 
he received faculties, which would carry him of their 
own spontaneous motion to believe in the existence of 
that Creator, to reverence him, to fear him, and to 
invoke him. Hence the futility of the attempt to 
induce mankind to disbelieve a Supreme Being ! Man 
cannot alter his own constitution, and therefore he can 
never reject his dependence on God. He may not 
believe in the true God, but he must believe in the 
existence of some being superior to himself ; nay, he 
must deprecate his wrath, he must implore his mercy : 



26 



man's constitution. 



lie cannot do otherwise, for sucli is his nature, and he 
cannot change it— Hence arises the importance of 
having true notions of God, not only for ourselves, but 
that we may impart the blessings, which we derive from 
this knov/ledge to others. — But to proceed : man is 
endowed with intellect.. He is gifted with intellectual 
pov/ers, which have been denied to all other tenants of 
the earth, which stamp his superiority over them all, and 
which alone would be sufficient to establish the most 
evident proofs of deliberate design, and benevolent 
contrivance on the part of that Being who made him 
such. He alone can consider the past and improve by 
it. He alone can direct his mind to the improvement 
of his race. He alone can make discoveries in science. 
He alone can invent arts and instruments to help him 
in his wants. He alone can cast a glance on all that 
surrounds him, and judge of causes and effects. He 
alone can apply his understanding to the moral govern- 
ment of the world. He alone can carry his thoughts 
upon the past, embrace the future, and with a rapidity, 
as quick as lightning, survey things passing at the 
extremity of the earth, and paint to himself at one view 
the most vivid recollection of things, that have happened 
at any distance of time, and in any part of the globe. 
Such is the power of thought ! — Pass from the finite to 
the infinite. Apply this to that almighty and mysterious 
power, who created man such, and of whom he is a mere 



TESTIMONY OF ALL MEN. 



27 



shadow : you have at once a clear idea of that Spirit^ 
who created all things, who governs all tilings, who sees 
all things, and to whom the past and the future are alike 
present. 

The consentient testimony of all men has acknow- 
ledged the power of God. I say all men, for even those 
who have denied the existence of God, or a personal 
deity, as they are pleased to call him, are not to be 
excepted. These men say, that there is a certain 
mysterious and miknown povrer, by which the universe 
is ruled, and by which man and all animals w^ere made ; 
but they pretend that they cannot tell what it is. They 
call it nature, and assert that every thing is the creature 
of absolute necessity. Nature can only be the effect of 
fixed and given causes : it is the result of primary 
arrangement and contrivance, and not the contriver. 
Nothing can prove the necessity, that man and animals 
should have been contrived and formed as they are, or 
indeed that they should have existed at ail. By absolute 
necessity, therefore, if they mean any thing, they 
must mean the fate of the ancients, which was said 
to be more pow^erful than the Gods themselves. 
Then they are constrained to admit that there is a 
certain power independent of matter, which directs and 
influences matter, by whose absolute will, or at least 
direction, all things are governed. This power is the 
Supreme, the Almighty, the Wise, and Benevolent Being, 



28 



man's creation. 



whom we call God, who made us, and who has reserved 
for us higher destinies, than those, which we possess in 
this world. — How important then is it for us, truly to 
know what those destinies are ! Thence follows the 
necessity of a revelation, of which I shall take a brief 
survey, before I pass to the principal subject of my 
address, which is the divine mission of Jesus Christ, 
and the founding of his Church. 

Man was created pure and without sin ; he was 
created after the image of his Maker, who gave him all 
the faculties, suited to a state of happiness and innocence, 
and at the same time, of activity and employment. 
Reason naturally tells us, that such must have been his 
condition, since we can form a clear conception of it by 
examining those higher faculties, which every man 
naturally possesses, and which would tend to make him 
lead a life of innocence and happiness, if they were not 
clouded and controlled by propensities, which obtain the 
mastery over him, whenever he is left to follow the 
guidance of his corrupt inclinations. 

To the promise of immortality, which was to be 
attached to this happy state, was annexed one single 
engagement, which, though so important, was most 
easy — this condition was obedience to the law of God ; 
it was the practice of submission and humility ; a depend- 
ance of the creature upon the will of the Creator. Man 
chose to disobey this injunction, he fell : he knew evil 



FALL OF MAN. 



29 



and entailed woe and misery upon his posterity. But 
God, though he punished man, did not forsake him. 
He had created him to he happy and immortal ; 
therefore, at the same time that he cursed him for his 
disobedience, he made the gracious promise, that the 
seed of the ivoman should break the head of the serpent, 
which tempted her to sin. This seed o f the woman is 
the Lord Jesus Christ, who in due time was bom of a 
woman, — that " through death he might destroy him 
that had the power of death, that is, the devil : and 
deliver them who, through fear of death, were all their 
lifetime subject to bondage ''—(Heb. ii. 14, 15.) 
" Wherefore, in all things it behoved him to be made 
like unto his brethren ; that he might be a merciful and 
faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make 
reconciliation for the sins of the people'' — (Heb. ii. 17.) 

It is not my intention, nor does it enter into the plan 
I have in view, to trace out to you the history of the 
human race. I shall limit myself to giving you the 
outlines of a few of the most striking events which are 
connected with my subject, which is, the existence of 
Jesus Christ, his atonement for the sins of mankind, 
and the establishment of his Church. 

Men grew in wickedness ; they forsook God, and he 
resolved to destroy the existing race of mankind, with 
the exception of Noah and his family. 

All the striking events and dispensations in the 



30 



TRADITION OF A ELOOD. 



sacred Scriptures may be said to be typical of Christ 
ard his Church. Noah, the just man, is chosen to 
preserve the race of man. How few enter the ark with 
him ! — ^and these are all members of his own family. 
Jesus Christ came to save sinners, that is to say, all 
men : yet how few are his followers, members of his 
household ! Even at this day, of the ten hundred 
millions, who pecple the earth, there are hardly two 
hundred and fifty millions who acknov^ledge his name : 
and even of these^ how fevf obey his word, and sincerely 
call upon him, as their only Saviour ! 

All nations of antiquity had the tradition of some 
immense fiood, which had passed over their land, and 
had swept away the greatest part of its inhabitants. 
M. Pauthier, in his excellent work upon China, Vv^hich 
forms one of the series of L'Univers Pittoresque, has 
clearly established the fact, that the Chinese have 
authentic written records of a flood, which had inun- 
dated their countiy, the low lands of which were not 
rescued from the waters till a considerable period after, 
and till the population had already become numerous. 
The date of their annals agrees in a very striking manner 
with the epoch usually assigned to the deluge from the 
writings of Moses. 

Men again multiplied, and were dispersed over the 
various countries of the earth ; they soon forgot the 
catastrophe, which had happened to their forefathers. 



CALL OF ABRAHAM. 



31 



and tliey neglected the worship of the true God, So it 
pleased God to call out unto himself a chosen people in 
the person of Ahraham. In the calling of Ahraham 
and his descendants we see again a clear figure of Christy 
and his people, who should have faith in him, and be 
chosen hy him ; as in the sacrifice of Isaac is represented 
the sacrifice which God made of his only Son for the 
redemption of all true believers, who were to be made 
sons of Abraham by faith. 

With regard to the Old Testament, I shall limit 
myself, by saying, that the history of the Jewish people 
is a continued figure of the coming of Christ in the 
flesh, of His sacrifice for sinners, and of the present as 
well as future designs of God with regard to man. In 
that history there are many events that, taken by them- 
selves, appear dark and arbitrary ; but which, when 
considered as explanatory of the views of Divine Provi- 
dence upon the whole of mankind, tend to prove the 
truth of all the promises which God has been pleased to 
make to us. 

I must add a few words vrith regard to the authenti- 
city of the books of Moses, which many contend never 
to have been written by him, and not to have been 
known to the Jews before their return from captivity. 
This assertion, made with great assurance and a show 
of learning, is often calculated to mislead many persons, 
who have not the means or the will to verify its truth 



32 AUTHENTICITY OF THE BOOKS OF MOSES. 

or falsehood, and are too ready to admit whatever tends 
to discredit revelation. 

I should not insist on this point, did I not know, 
that in a few years hence, when you come to mix in the 
world, you will meet hoth in France and in this country 
with many young men, who, taking for knowledge the 
few ideas, which they have gathered from the pages of 
authors fond of their own conceit, and biassed by a party- 
spirit, boldly and inconsiderately repeat such assertions 
as these ; that the books of Moses were never written 
by Moses himself, and that all the books which are 
presented to us as revelations from God to man, are 
mere inventions of men interested to deceive their 
contemporaries, and impose upon posterity. 

■ Religion is not the fruit of reasoning alone ; it is an 
inward conviction of the soul, founded upon a dependence 
on a Supreme Power, and an intimate persuasion, that 
he cares for the affairs of men, and is pleased to com- 
municate his will to those who seek him with a pure 
and humble heart. 

But this inward conviction requires to be guided and 
enlightened ; or else it degenerates into fanaticism or 
grovelling superstition. So we must have recourse to 
our understanding, and examine both the external and 
internal evidences, which tend to corroborate the truth 
of those laws and observances, which are presented to 
us as given under the express command of the Deity 
himself. 



WRITTEN DOCUMENTS. 



33 



This observation must shew } ou forcibly the impor- 
tance of having written documents, and not mere verbal 
traditions. For if the word of God had been transmitted 
to us orally, and not by writing, it could not have been 
maintained in its purity through two generations 
following. Nay, the narration of the events which daily 
happen around us, every circumstance of which is related 
with more or less variation, even by those in whose 
presence they have taken place, gives us clearly to 
understand that this must necessarily have happened. 

W e have as proofs of the existence of the books of 
Moses previous to the return of the Jews from captivity, 
the general consent of the Jewish people, their ceremo- 
nies, their laws, their worship, which were founded upon 
these very writings. The constant allusions made to 
them in books subsequently written, the unanimous 
admission of ancient pagan authors, who never thought 
of calling the existence of Moses and the authenticity 
of his books into question, and the fact that the 
Samaritans, a people who bore a violent enmity to the 
Jews, had been from time immemorial in possession 
of the Pentateuch, which they acknowledged as the only 
Scriptures divinely inspired, incontestably coiToborate 
the antiquity of this part of the sacred Scriptures. 

M. Champollion Figeac, in his learned book on the 
History of Egypt, bears testimony to the full agreement 
of the dates in Genesis concerning the coming into 





34 



MOSESe 



Egypt of Abraham, as well as Joseph and his father 
Jacob with his brothers. 

With regard to Moses, he says : C'est a Memphis, 
a 25 lieues de la mer Rouge, que se sont passes les 
grands evenements, ou Mo'ise joue le principal role. 
II entreprend, par I'ordre de Dieu, de delivrer les 
Hebreux de I'esclavage, ou ils vivent en Egypte depuis 
plusieurs siecles. Les xlrabes Bedouins out conserve 
jusqu' a nos jours la tradition du passage de la Mer 
Rouge par Moi'se, et ils donnent encore a quelques 
fontaines d'eau douce le nom de Fontaines de Mo'ise. 
On sait la suite de ce grand evenement, les Israelites 

arriverent sains et sanfs au desert de Sinai' 

Toutes les descriptions de ces lieux mentionnes dans la 
Bible sout encore d'une complete exactitude : on y suit 
Moise errant avec son peuple aux environs du Sinai 
Ainsi rhisioire des rois d'Egypte est intime- 
ment melee aux narrations de la Bible, et nous aurons 
encore plusieurs fois I'occasion de faire voir quelles se 
pre tent un secours mutuel et concourent par leur 
temoignage a la manifestation de la verite de Thistoire 
generale.""^ 

Such testimonies on the part of well-informed and 

* " It is at Memphisj 25 leagues from the Red Sea, that the 
gi'eat events happened, in which Moses acted the piincipal part. 
He undertook by the command of God to deliver the Hebrews 
from the slavery, in which they had been living in Egypt for 
several centuiies. The Bedwin Arabs have preserved till our 



THE PEOPLE OF GOD. 



35 



trustworthy men tend to confirm the truth of revelation. 
God in his secret designs towards the human race 
separates to himself a chosen people. He conducts 
them^ he governs them as it were in spite of themselves 
by a long series of miracles. Many detached facts in 
the history of that people appear by themselves revolting 
and anomalous ; but united and compared together, 
they are striking figures of the state of man both present 
and future, and of the redemption of mankind by Christ, 
the Son of God, of whom the sacrifices of the old law 
were so many types and figures. 

As my object in writing these remarks is to prove to 
you the truth of a revelation, and to shew that God in 
his divine providence has been pleased to provide a 
remedy against the fall of m.an and the evils which he 
had entailed upon himself by his transgression, I shall 
now pass to the immediate subject of this address, which 
is the incarnation of his Son in the person of Jesus 
Christ, and the founding of his Church. 

days the tradition of the passage of the Red Sea by Moses^ 
and they still give the name of Fountains of Moses to a few springs 

of soft water The sequel of this great event is known; 

the Israelites arrived in safety to the desert of Mount Sinai 

Ail the descriptions of those places mentioned in the Bible are still 
of a complete exactness : we can follow there Moses wandering with 
his people in the neighbouring places of Sinai. Thus the history of 
the kings of Egypt is closely connected with the narrations of the 
Bible : we shall have again several times an occasion to show that 
they give each other a mutual support and concur by their testimony 
to elucidate the truth of general history." 

c 2 



CHAPTEE III. 



" And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us." 

John i. 14. 



The first question we must ask ourselves, is, did Jesus 
Christ really exist as a man, at the time, in which we 
are told he lived, preached and died ? This question 
is the more important, as there are at the present day 
many men, who assert that the whole narration of his 
life, is nothing but a myth, or to use a plainer word, a 
fable, an allegory. One of the principal proofs they 
allege against the personal existence of Christ, is the 
silence of Josephus, the Jewish historiai^ 

In the history of Josephus, there is a passage, which 
mentions in most explicit terms, the wonderful life of 
Jesus, his condemnation by Pilate, and even his resur- 



EXISTENCE OF CHRIST. 



37 



rection. If this passage was genuine, it would settle 
at once the question so far as Josephus is concerned. 
But it seems now generally admitted by all critics 
of every persuasion, that it is spurious, and that 
it was inserted in the work most likely in the course of 
the third century. 

Christians acknowledge the insertion of that famous 
passage concerning Christ to be spurious. They deplore 
the blind zeal, the want of honesty and candour which 
prompted some mistaken zealots of the third century, 
to have recourse to a forgery in order to give additional 
support, as they thought, to a Chnrch, against which the 
gates of hell, that is to say, the malice, the ignorance, 
the corruption of men, can never prevail. It stands 
upon a rock, against vv^hich the attacks of open enemies 
from without, and the errors, frauds, and superstitions 
of misguided members from within will ever fail, and 
that rock is the Vv^ord of God, Christ himself being the 
chief corner stone. 

Would to God that this was the only forgery which 
every friend to the purity of the Gospel had to reproach 
that third and some subsequent centuries ! But the 
same spirit which prompted this addition to the works 
of Josephus, spread its blighting blast over the purest 
truth : and behind it a mist arose, which went on 
increasing till it had clouded all the primitive light of 
the Gospel, and made it almost impossible to distinguish 
truth from error. 



38 SILENCE OF JOSEPHUS. 

Admitting that Josephus makes no allusion to Jesus 
Christ, are we to take this as a proof that Christ did not 
exist P Is the silence of one historian concerning any 
important fact to invalidate the assertion of several others? 
We have not only four historians in the writers of the 
four Gospels, who bear testimony to Jesus Christ ; but 
we have the narrative of the Acts of the Apostles, 
bearing all the marks of a plain, unadorned relation of 
events, in which constant reference is made to a fact 
known to many then living, some of whom had even 
taken an active part in accomplishing it, namely, the 
sufferings and death of Jesus Christ, upon which the 
apostles based the doctrines which they were commis- 
sioned to teach. 

They spoke to Jews, or to Romans living among the 
Jews. His resurrection might be doubted (as in fact it 
was by the majority of the Jews), because he had been 
seen after it only by a certain number of his disciples, 
however, sufficiently numerous, to prevent the suspicion 
of any collusion or conspiracy. But his death was 
never brought into question, as undoubtedly it must 
have been by the Jews, had they not known him : and 
if it had been the case, veiy likely Josephus himself and 
some others would not have failed to record it. Whereas, 
the silence of Josephus is evidently a studied silence. 
He wrote his history about forty years after the death 
of Christ : he does not notice the existence of the 



FALSE GOSPELS. 



39 



Christians, even as a sect; yet he cannot have failed 
being acquainted with them. They were numerous not 
only in Judea, but even in Rome, and all the eastern 
provinces of the Roman empire. They had already 
been the object of public enmity ; they had been 
persecuted, and mentioned by name in public edicts ; 
they had been the subject of public strifes, and exposed 
to violent abuse on the part of the Jews in Jerusalem 
and in all the principal cities of the empire. If the 
main part, the life of Jesus Christ and his being put to 
death, had not been generally known ; if it had even 
been doubted ; most certainly, Josephus, who does not 
notice the Christians, probably on account of the claims 
vdiich they put forward to an universal religion, and to 
the accomplishment of the prophecies by the coming of 
the Messiah in the person of Jesus Christ, would not 
have lost this opportunity of confuting their pretensions, 
by showing that this Messiah was only an imaginary 
being, of whom his countrymen had no knowledge 
whatever. 

Again it is objected, that many false gospels appeared 
in the early days of the Church. This is riot denied ; 
but they sprung most of them from the fancy of those 
Oriental philosophers, who early embraced Christianity, 
because they thought they saw in Jesus Christ the 
extraordinary messenger, whom they expected, to 
regenerate the world. But these very forgeries tend to 
prove the authenticity of the true Gospels, 



1 



40 IMAGE OF THE VIKGIN. 

If a writer professes to fill a chasm in any narrative, 
and inserts some particulars^ which he thinks will makt; 
it more complete, this act of his proves the previous 
existence of that history, just as the repairing a hreach 
in a wail shows that the wall must have stood some time 
hefore. 

These Eastern philosophers mixed the fanciful reveries 
of oriental theogony with the simple truth of the Gospel. 
They were disowned and condemned hy the real Chris- 
tians ; and though they inflicted evils upon Christianity, 
some of which remain to this day both in the Latin and 
Greek churches, yet the intrusion of their ideas shows 
plainly that Christianity did exist in a pure form, hefore 
they became acquainted with it and attempted to defile 
it with their allegories. 

But the objectors insist also as a proof of the person 
of Christ being a myth or a personification of the ideas 
and opinions prevailing at his birth, that the worship of 
the Virgin and her child was common in the East ages 
before the generally received account of Christ's 
appearance in the flesh. They mention several churches 
in Portugal and in Italy, especially the famous chapel 
of Loreto,* commonly called the Holy House, (because 

* In the book entitled, " Le glorie maestose del Santuarlo di 
Loreto," published, " Con Privilegio del Sommo Pontefice," and 
dedicated " all' Eminentissimo Principe, II Signor Cardinale Altieri," 
there is an image of the Holy House, with this inscription : " La 
Sagrosanta Casa di Nasaret, per disposizione divina di Galilea dagl' 
Angeli trapassando la Siria, Macedonia, Albania, et Dalmazia, 



IMAGE OF THE VIRGIN. 



41 



according to one of those fabulous traditions, upon 
which the Church of Rome props itself, the house, 
which the blessed Virgin once inhabited, was miraculously 
transported through the air to that spot) in which the 
face of the Virgin and the child is black : and they 
contend that this is a clear proof that the worship of 
Christ is identical with that of the Chrishna of the 
Hindoos, and as Chrishna was only a personification of 
the God Sun, who is represented in the form of a child, 
when in the sign of the Virgin he enters into a new 
year and a new course, they say that the history of Jesus 
Christ is only a new version of that most ancient worship 
spread over all the East. 

Such an assertion is calculated to impose upon many, 
who rest satisfied w^ith the specious arguments by which 
it is supported, such as the time of keeping the festivals 
of the Church and the ancient practice of erecting 
the altar of Churches towards the east, to which the 
people turned to pray. But to a person, who sincerely 
inquires into these practices, it will appear clear and 
evident that many of them are the remains of ancient 
superstitions, which were blended with the simple forms 
of Christian worship, and that they tend rather to 

miglia Italiaue 1895, fu trasportata a Tersatto nell' Istria, di la per 
I'Adriatico miglia 145 a Loreto. 

The Holy House of Nasareth, through divine ordinance, passing 
over S^Tia, Macedonia, Ajbania, and Dalmatia, was transported by 
Angels from Galilee to Tersatto in Tstria, the space of 1895 Italian 
miles, from thence to Loreto over the Adriatic 8ea the space oi 145. 



42 



THE GNOSTICS. 



demonstrate the separate and manifest identity of Jesus 
Christ ; therefore the conclusion he must come to is, that 
the Christian religion was perfectly distinct from those 
numerous systems, which abounded in the East and 
the Roman empire, before some of their practices were 
engrafted upon its original simplicity. Now to the 
proofs. 

The most ancient class of heretics, whose opinions 
were espoused by any numerous body of men were 
undoubtedly the Gnostics, or those \vho boasted to 
restore mankind to a perfect knowledge of the Supreme 
Being. The first promoters of those opinions are to be 
traced even to the time of the apostles. They were 
themselves divided into several sects : they multiplied 
greatly, and continued to exist under different names 
till at least the fifth century of the Church. 

In the early days of the Church some of the Oriental 
philosophers, who were in great numbers in Syria, 
Egypt, and Asia Minor, seeing the miraculous powers 
with which the apostles of Jesus Christ were endowed, 
and being made acquainted with his sanctity and wisdom, 
as well as his death and his resurrection, were ready to 
acknowledge him as the great messenger invested with 
divine authority, appointed to enlighten the darkened 
minds of men and to deliver them from the oppression 
of the tyrants of this world, whom they expected. Even 
Porphiry, that bitter enemy to Christianity, makes a 



THE GNOSTICS. 



43 



clear distinction between tliem and the followers of the 
apostles, when he says, that there vrere at that time 
many heretics w^ho derived their heresy from ancient 
philosophy. These men in acknowledging Jesus Christ 
as that heavenly messenger vdiom they expected, were 
far from conforming themselves to the doctrines and 
opinions of the Christians and adopting the explanations 
of the apostles and other disciples, vvho had seen Jesus 
Christ in the flesh, had received his precepts from his 
own mouth and had been witnesses of his death, as well 
as his resurrection and ascension. They rejected his 
humanity upon the supposition that every thing 
corporeal is evil in itself: so they denied that he was 
clothed with a real body, and that he suffered really for 
the sake of mankind. They denied his divinity, though 
they considered him as the Son of God, sent by the 
everlasting Father for the happiness of the miserable 
mortals. They considered him as the first of those 
(Eons, or emanations from the Supreme Deity, a belief 
in which constituted the leading tenets of Eastern 
theogony. 

It would appear that St. Paul makes an allusion to 
them, when he says, ( 1 Tim. vi. 20,) O Timothy keep 
that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane 
and vain babblings and opposition of science (gnosis) 
falsely so called : Which some professing, have erred 
concerning the faith." 



44 



THE GNOSTICS. 



The early appearance of this sect is then of great 
importance to establish by means of external evidence 
the two cardinal points^ upon which the Christian reli- 
gion is based, namely the humanity of Jesus Christ and 
his divinity as Son of God. The Gnostics embraced 
Christianity ; they did not introduce it. its doctrine 
must have been preached, and must have made a consi- 
derable number of proselytes, before they were attracted 
by the miracles attending the preaching of the apostles. 
Struck with the sublime precepts of Christ, they adopted 
him as the deliverer, whom they expected. They did 
not deny his personal appearance on earth, at the time 
announced by so many eye-witnesses; but they pretended 
that his body was not a real body, because all matter is 
corrupt, and nothing corrupt could envelope the first 
and purest emanation from the Supreme Deity :— a proof 
that they were fully persuaded of his having been seen 
by the eye-witnesses, who related the facts of his life ; 
though they contended that he had suffered and died in 
appearance only. 

They rejected his divinity, though they made him an 
emanation from the Supreme Deity — a proof that the 
apostles in preaching Jesus Christ crucified for the sins 
of mankind, announced him as the Son of God, equal 
with the Father, God himself. They separated from 
the main body of Christians, and assembled by them- 
selves, therefore it is evident their views greatly differed 
from those of the Church, which they had at first joined. 



IMAGES. 



45 



It is well known that the Gnostics were the first who 
introduced images and figures in their places of worship. 
They represented the eternal Father under the form of 
an old man, similar to those heads which are yet to be 
seen in some churches on the Continent, attached to the 
summit of the arch between tlie nave and the chancel. 
They had images of the Virgin, issuing from the waves 
or trampling upon the head of a serpent, holding a child 
in her arms, such as those which are still to be seen in 
the temples of Buddha or of Fo."^ Images of this kind, 
or with slight modifications were afterwards adopted in 
the Christian Churches, several centuries later, when 
the Gnostic heresy had dwindled or died away, and the 
origin of this sort of image began to be unknown, or 
lost sight of. For with time the Christians thought fit 
to warm their devotion by introducing in their temples 
the images of Christ and of the Saints in imitation of 
the paintings and statues, whicb had formerly adorned 
the heathen temples. But tbis does not prove a com- 
mon origin ; it shows even the two distinct sources of 
belief, when we go up to the time, when it was first 
introduced. For we know how careful the early Chris- 
tians were, not to break the second commandment by 

* When the English army was in China, a letter appeared in one 
of the London papers, from an English officer, who described the 
images he had seen in a Chinese temple. Among others he 
mentioned that of a Virgin issuing from the waves and holding an 
infant in her arms; "which image, he said, would be a very fit 
ornament for some temples nearer home." 



46 



CONSENT OF THE JEWS. 



introducmg images in tlieir places of worship ; and it 
was not till after the mass of the Gentiles had become 
Christians^, and the Christian religion had obtained the 
support of the emperors, that this abuse followed many 
others which had previously crept in."^ 

Another external proof, which corroborates the exist- 
ence of Jesus, as a man, at the time mentioned in the 
Gospels, is the general consent of the Jews. How could 
the apostles have spoken of an imaginary being, 
crucified among them, whom moreover they announced 
as the Messiah, without being at once put down as 
notorious impostors ? The Jews in all ages have admitted 
the real existence of Jesus at the time mentioned in the 
Gospels ; though they say that he v/as of the tribe of 
Benjamin, and they attribute his power of working 
miracles to his stealing the sacred name of God, the 
Tetragrammaton, which was kept in the Holy of Holies. 
And how great is the internal evidence ! Without speak- 
ing of the general agreement of the Gospels ; the Acts of 
the Apostles, their various epistles, and especially those 
of St. Paul, who allows himself to have been a fierce 
persecutor of Christ from the very beginning, establish 
the existence of Christ, as an historical personage, upon 

* When Adrian, the emperor, had commanded that temples should 
be made in all cities without images, it was presently conceived that 
he did prepare those temples for Christ, as (Elius Lampridius noteth 
in the Life of Alexander Severus : which is an evident argument 
that it was not the use of Christians in those days to have any 
images in their Churches, — Archbishop Ushers ansiver to a Jesuit. 



DECEPTION OF THE SENSES, 



47 



surer foundations, than that of most great men of 
antiquity. 

It is the duty of every Christian to receive the holy 
Scriptures as divinely inspired, as a book written by 
divine authority, and to submit his reason to the light 
of faith : for without faith it is impossible to please God. 
But this sacrifice of our reason, against which so many 
exclaim and vent out their highly wrought indignation, 
is not greater than that, which the most common natural 
phenomena require from those proud, those w^ould be 
all-knowing individuals : yet they do noi hesitate to yield 
implicit belief to the assertions of natural philosophers, 
whose statements rather resemble the extravagancies of 
a mad-man, than the conclusions of a wise and accurate 
observer. The distance of the stars, their magnitude, 
the rapidity of light, the minuteness of animalcules, 
millions of which will not cover a square inch, these and 
a hundred other phenomena are assented to, though 
they are beyond the reach of the reason of those who 
believe them. 

Now I w^ll instance one of our senses, just to shew 
you how deceitful our senses are, how erroneous are the 
conclusions of our reason. When we look at a colour, 
red for instance, we all acknowledge that it is red, and 
are very apt to think that the colour is in the stuff, is 
fixed and permanent. But how great is our delusion ! 
Opticians now tell us that the diversity of colours 



48 



DECEPTION OF THE SENSES. 



proceeds from tlie frequency of certain periodical 
motions^ wMcli return regularly at frequent intervals, at 
least five hundred millions of millions of time, in one 
second. In the sensation which red causes us, our eyes 
are affected 482 millions of millions of times — in that 
caused by yelloiv 542 — in that caused by violet 707 
millions of millions of times per second I"^ This is an 
exercise iox faith, which would be sufficiently great, if 
we were told that such results took place every hour. 
But every second, the sixtieth part of one minute ! how 
wonderful ! how incredible ! Yet we dare not disbelieve 
for fear of passing for unlearned. Therefore you see 
that the Christian, who believes that the Gospel is the 
word of God, and from it acknowledges Jesus Christ as 
the Son of God, the Redeemer of mankind, is not the 
only one who sacrifices his reason to the light of faith — 
who believes that which he does not understand in its 
full extent. 

See Herschel's Discourse on the Study of Natural Philosophy. 



CHAPTEE IV. 



" There are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the 
Word, the Holy Ghost : and these three ai-e One." 1 John y. 7. 



The confession of faith, which we have learned from 
our infancy, begins thus : I believe in God, the Father 

Almighty — and in Jesus Christ, his only Son I 

believe in the Holy Ghost. Now we solemnly ac- 
knowledge one God, and we distinguish him into three 
distinct powers, commonly called persons, by the 
appellation of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost: do we 
then acknowledge three personal deities, as the word 
person would seem to imply, according to our ideas of 
personal existence ? We believe in the words of Jesus 
himself, that he and the Father are one, and we also 
believe him, when he tells his disciples that they must 

D 



50 



TRINITY. 



baptize in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and 
of the Holy Spirit. His words are the ground of our 
believe. Since the most simple operations of matter, 
which we daily witness, are beyond our comprehension, 
we cannot expect ever to come to a perfect knowledge 
of the Infinite Deity himself: yet our reason can seize 
in the contemplation of the material world a faint image 
of a Trinity in the Godhead, a glimmering of which so 
many of the ancient systems seem to have retained. 

Even if we consider ourselves, shall we not find 
v^ithin our own mind traces of that tri-une power, the 
perfect essence of which is the attribute, the property 
of the Divine Being alone ? We cannot fail to observe 
within us three sets of faculties, perfectly independent, 
perfectly distinct, yet forming only one being. We 
perceive faculties, which give vigour and energy to the 
mind — faculties, which direct us in our conduct to other 
individuals, and in the respect and veneration we owe 
to the Supreme Being — and faculties, which enable us 
to observe, to know, to reflect, and to judge. These 
three kinds of faculties, though forming one homo- 
geneous whole, one mind, are nevertheless perfectly 
distinct ; and whoever will observe the working of his 
own mind, will acknowledge that they are entirely 
separate and independent in their operations. 

So; though it is impossible for us in our present state 
perfectly to know God, we can at least conceive in him 



TRINITY. 



51 



a, trinity of self-existing powers, without dividing the 
unity of the Essence, and we acknowledge in the Father, 
God the Supreme Governor of the universe — in the 
Son, God the Mediator — in the Holy Spirit, God the 
Sanctifier. 

But it is to the Word of God, that we entirely trust 
for the ground of our belief. We believe with St. Paul, 
that All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and 
is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for 
instruction in righteousness :" and therefore we believe 
that God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the 
spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, be- 
lieved on in the world, and received up into glory." — 
( 1 Timothy iii. 16.) As we believe that God is Almighty, 
we believe that Jesus was born of a Virgin, and though 
a saying of Plutarch is quoted by the adversaries of 
Christianity to prove that this is impossible, we contend 
that this is not more impossible with God, than the 
creation of the first man, to which the wwds of Plutarch 
cannot apply; unless it be pretended (which no one 
now dares to maintain) that man is from all eternity. 
Therefore we yield implicit faith, in the words of the 
angel to Mary^ — The Holy Ghost shall come upon 
thee and the power of the Highest shall overshadow 
thee : therefore also that holy thing which shall be 
born of thee, shall be called the Son of God." We 
believe in Jesus Christ's own words^ when he says : 

B 2 



52 



TRINITYe 



The Father and I are one. — He that has seen me has 
seen the Father o.. And whatsoever ye shall ask in my 
name, that will I do, that the Father may he glorified 
in the Son — and I will pray to the Father and he shall 
give you another Comforter, that he may abide with 
yon for ever, the Spirit of Truth." On these grounds 
we admit a Trinity in the Unity of the Godhead, ac- 
cording to the last words of Jesus in St, Matthew's 
gospel— Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, 
baptizing them in name of the Father, and of the Son^ 
and of the Holy Ghost.** 



CHAPTEE V. 



" Of a truth God is no respecter of persons : but in every nation 
he that feareth him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with 
him." Acts x. 34. 



We believe on the faith of Scripture thai Christ 
redeemed men by the sacrifice of his life and expiated 
the sins of mankind by his blood : therefore " there is 
one God and one Mediator between God and man, the 
man Christ Jesus, who gave himself a ransom for all 
to be testified in due time" — (1 Timothy ii.) Jesus 
then died as an atonement for the sins of men : he rose 
again from the dead for their justification and he 
ascended on high for their sanctification. Therefore we 
acknowledge him as the Redeemer and the only 
Mediator between God and men. 

As by his coming upon earth and his returning into 



54 



NEW COVENANT. 



heaven, the end of the law given to Moses was accom- 
plished and he established a neiv covenant, to which all 
nations were to he called, he must have prescribed new 
conditions and given new institutions, by which his 
followers were to be governed and distinguished. These 
conditions were repentance towards God and faith in 
our Lord Jesus Christ ; and the new institutions vrere 
the sacraments of baptism and the Lord's sapper, after- 
wards called the eucharist, or fountain of grace, by the 
Greeks. He provided fit messengers of the glad tidings 
of grace in the persons of his apostles and disciples, to 
whom he said after his resurrection : " All power is 
given unto me in heaven and earth : go ye therefore and 
teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the 
Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost : 
teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have 
commanded you ; and, lo, I am with you alway, even 
unto the end of the world/' — (Matthew xxviii. 19, 20.J 
Accordingly, after the descent of the Holy Spirit on 
the apostles on the day of Pentecost, they issued forth 
into Jerusalem, and being miraculously endowed with 
the gift of tongues, they proclaimed to the Jews 
assembled from all countries, who had come to Jerusalem 
to celebrate the gi^at festivals, that Jesus of Nazareth, 
who did great miracles and wonders among them (as the 
Jews themselves knew) and whom being delivered by 
the determinate counsel and fore -knowledge of God 



CATHOLIC CHURCH. 



55 



they had crucified and slain, was raised up and was both 
Lord and Christ. 

They began at Jerusalem according to the command 
of Jesus, who had told them that repentance and remis- 
sion of sins should be preached in his name, beginning 
at Jerusalem. After having preached to the Jews 
throughout Judea, they spread themselves by degrees 
in the adjoining provinces, and in the space of a very 
(ew years, the word of God announcing salvation 
through Jesus crucified was preached throughout Syria, 
Egypt, Asia Minor, Greece, and Italy, besides the 
countries of the East, such as Arabia and the vast 
provinces of Persia, w^hich were then under the dominion 
of the Parthian dynasty. 

It appears that the first Christians, even the apostles 
themselves did not understand at once the extent of their 
mission, and the generality of the redemption which 
they announced, for they at first limited their preaching 
to the Jews, and it was not till after the miraculous con- 
version of St. Paul, who was especially chosen of God 
to carry to the Gentiles the Gospel of truth, that the 
Gentiles were called upon to repent and believe in 
Jesus, and a Catholic Church, that is, a Church open 
to all nations by faith in Christ was first founded. In 
the midst of much opposition and persecution, first from 
the Jews and afterwards from the Pagans, excited by 
the Jews, the Christian religion gained numerous pro- 



66 



DIVISIONS, 



selytes; and churclies, that is, congregations of believers 
seem to have been established in almost every town, or 
at least in all the principal places of the Roman empire^ 
when the Christians were first persecuted by the Roman 
government, under the emperor Nero, about thirty- 
five years after the death of Christ. As up to that period 
many of the apostles were still living, and St. Paul 
wrote several of his epistles, while he was actually a 
prisoner at Rome, it is very essential before we proceed 
further to stop a moment and to consider the spectacle 
presented to us by the Christian Church, when its 
founders and natural guardians still remained to govern 
and direct it. 

Even at that period it was not without contentions. 
Almost from the very establishment of the Church, there 
were divisions and separations ; but these chiefly arose 
from men who having very imperfectly embraced the 
doctrines of Christ and his apostles mixed them with 
their old notions and practices of heathenism or 
Judaism. For it is of great importance in this inquiry 
to observe, that all those who went out of the body of 
the Church and fonned separate sects, held certain 
erroneous doctrines generally concerning Christ, in the 
relation in which he stands with God and men, the 
doctrines which he taught, his atonement or the worship 
which was due to him. Hence arose the word Heresy > 
which originally meant only choice ; but which soon 



CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE. 



57 



became a mark of infamy, the brand which contending 
factions hurled at each other with unheard of fury ; 
which lighted up the torches of cruelty and revenge, 
when with the favour of princes the curse of the priest 
had obtained the aid of brute force. In the beginning 
then, they alone were heretics, who taught and entertained 
errors contrary to the teaching of Christ and his apostles, 
or mixed the abuses of ancient systems with the pure 
and simple doctrine of Christianity. 

But where shall we look for that doctrine ? Where, 
but in the books expressly written to inculcate it — and 
to relate the labours of those who had been deputed to 
teach it ? It is very obvious that the Scriptures were 
not written from mere chance, as an opportunity arose 
(as it is often objected) for, if so, the same objection 
would apply to the Old Testament, as well as to the 
New. So these w^ords of St. Peter are equally appli- 
cable to the New as to the Old Testament : Knowing 
this first that no prophecy of the Scriptures is of any 
private interpretation or declaration. For the prophecy 
came not in old time by the will of man ; but holy 
men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy 
Ghost." He who had so surely censured the traditions 
of the Pharisees could not leave his universal religion 
exposed to the same errors. Therefore the writings 
of the apostles and evangelists must be our only guides, 
as they are undoubtedly the only ones to be trusted. 



58 



TRADITION TO BE REJECTED. 



It follows, then, that the Scriptures are, and can pro- 
perly be our only rule of faith ; so that whatever 
practice, whatever dogma is not sanctioned by their 
authority, is not binding upon us, and if it is opposed to 
that singleness of worship due to God alone, which 
Jesus Christ and his apostles taught, it is our duty to 
reject it as an abuse introduced by men, who mixed the 
purity of primitive faith with the conceits of their own 
imagination and the superstitious usages, which men of 
all ages have been apt to indulge in, or which w^ere the 
relics of antiquated errors. 

We are told that the mission of the apostles was to 
preach and not to write, and that they spoke many 
things which were not written, but only handed down by 
tradition ; and therefore, tradition as transmitted by the 
Church, is of equal authority with Scripture. Un- 
doubtedly they spoke many things which vvere not 
written; but their writings or those of their disciples, 
Vv^hich compose the New Testament, contain all the 
substance of their discourses upon things, pertaining to 
salvation. By preaching they only enlarged upon that 
which they taught, precisely as at present a preacher 
in a pulpit would explain at large a text of Scripture, 
but could not add new doctrines v/ithout incurring the 
charge of innovation and error. So St, Paul tells the 
Galatians — Though we, or an angel from heaven, 
preach any other Gospel unto you, than that which we 



VIEW OF THE EARLY CHURCH. 



59 



have preached unto you, let him be accursed" — Gal. i. S. 
We are no more bound to admit the traditions su])se- 
quent to the apostolic time, than we are obliged to 
believe in the authenticity of the Talm.ud and the 
Jewish traditions. It is therefore, very evident, that 
the books of the New Testament as well as those of the 
Old must be our only standard ; and whatever is not 
contained in the former is no more the doctrine of the 
apostles, than that, which is not in the books of Moses, 
is the law of Moses. It is then as much the duty of 
Christians through all ages, as it vras of the Jews in the 
time of isaiah to obey the command which God de- 
livered to his people by the mouth of his prophet : 
" To the law and testimony, if they speak not according 
to this word, it is because there is no light in them." 
(Isaiah, viii. 20. ) 

What a spectacle then does the infant Church pre- 
sent to us ! We see men without education, without 
influence, suddenly raised to the height of their mission 
by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, aided by mira- 
culous powers to enforce the truth of their doctrines, 
preaching Jesus crucified for the sins of mankind, 
boldly proclaiming to the Jev^ish people, that there is 
no other name under heaven given to men, through 
which they can be saved, that he is a propiation for their 
sins, and not only for theirs, but for those of the whole 
world, inviting ail to repentance and to newness of life. 



60 VIEW OF THE EARLY CHURCH. ^ 

All those that repented and believed, they baptized in 
the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of their sins, 
and laying hands on them they prayed, and they re- 
ceived the Holy Ghost. 

What was the practice of the new converts ? They 
continued stedfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellow- 
ship, and in breaking of bread and in prayer. Such 
was the worship of the first Christians. — What was their 
discipline ? The apostles in establishing new churches 
either nominated certain men or confirmed those 
pointed out by the congregation, which was named a 
Church, to teach and administer the afifairs of the com- 
munity. These men were known by the name of 
bishops, presbyters, and deacons. The bishop or 
presbyter presided at the religious service, in which a 
part of the Scriptures was publicly read, exhortations 
full of faith and charity were made to the people, 
prayers were repeated, hymns were sung, and the 
Lord's Supper was celebrated ; and often a repast 
called the feast of charity (because all brought their 
provisions to be eaten in common) ended the service. 
But abuses seem soon to have arisen from this practice : 
for we see that St. Paul severely censured the Cor- 
inthians for blending the Lord's Supper with this feast, 
and making it a common repast. 

The number of Christians continued amazingly to 
increase, and towards the end of the first century, that 



RAPID SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY. 61 



is about sixty years after the death of Christ, they 
already filled the Roman empire. We see this not only 
from the writings of Christians themselves, but from 
the edicts of Roman emperors, and a letter addressed by 
Pliny to Trajan, to consult him on the manner in which 
he should treat the Christians of the province of 
Bythinia, of which he was the governor. This letter is 
most valuable as an external evidence to show : first, 
that the Christians worshipped Christ as God: carmen- 
que Christo, quasi Deo, dicere secum invicem.* Second, 
how simple and pure was their form of worship : seque 
Sacramento non in scelus aliquod obstringere, sed ne 
furla, ne latrocinia, ne adulteria committerent, ne fidem 
fallerent, ne depositum appellati negarent ; quibus 
peractis, morem sibi discedendi fuisse rursusque coeundi 
ad capiendum cibum, iDromiscuum tamen et innoxium.f 
Third, how wonderfully their number had increased 
in so short a period. Multi enim omnis aetatis, 
omnis ordinis, utriusque sexus etiam vocantur in 
periculum et vocabuntur. Neque enim civitates tantum, 
sed vices etiam atque agros superstitionis istius contagio 

* They sang hymns among themselves to Christ as to a God. 

+ They bound themselves by oath, not to any crime, but that 
they should not commit robberies, tliefts, or adulteries, that they 
should not break their word, and that, when called upon, they 
should not deny having received a deposite ; which thiDgs being 
done they used to retire, then to assemble again, to take food, 
however a common and harmless food. 



62 



Pliny's letter. 



pervagata est. - It appears that, through fear of perse- 
cution many of those who had professed Christianity, 
frequented again the heathen temples which had hitherto 
been ahnost deserted. For he adds: Certe satis 
constat, prope jam desolata templa cospisse celehrari, et 
sacra solemnia diu infermissa repeti, passimque venire 
victimas, quarum adhuc rarissimus emtor inveniebatur. 
Ex quo facile est opinari, qu^ turba hominum emendari 
possit, si fiat ptEnitentise locus, f 

* Many of eyeiy age, of every order and of both sexes are exposed 
ana will be exposed to danger (by the edict of Trajan.) For the 
contagion of this Superstition has not only extended over the cities, 
but also over the villages and country places. 

f It is certainly very evident that the temples, which had been 
])efore alsnost deserted i3egin again to be frequented, that the sacred 
solemnities for a long time interrupted are resumed, and that the 
victims, of which hitherto few buyers were to be found, are brought 
from all sides. From which it is easy to judge what number of men 
can be refomied, if there be room left for repentance. 



CHAPTEE VI. 



"And 1 fell at his feet to worship him. And he said uuto me, 
See thou doit not. I am thy fellow servant, and of thy brethren 
that have the testimony of Jesus : Worship God." Rev. xix. 



It is difficult and often impossible to trace the exact 
period when any popular custom, any popular opinion 
or superstition took its rise. But it is sufficient to our 
purpose to know (which none of those who pay worship 
to the Saints will deny) that the first Christians knew^ 
nothing of the invocation of Saints. Such a worship 
was not certainly inculcated by the apostles, who were 
too much imbued with the spirit of pure Theism, to 
suffer that their followers should invoke any other man 
but the God-man, the Son of the Eternal Father, whom 
they were commissioned to preach as the only Mediator 
and Intercessor for the sins of mankind. 



64 . WORSHIP OF SAINTS. 



You have been told from high authority y that pray- 
ing to the Saints is a practice, which crept into the 
CHURCH, but that it is not necessary. The question 
was not fairly put, nor was it fairly answered : for the 
point at issue is ; whether it be right, or whether it be 
wrong ? If it be right, the Reverend gentleman ought not 
to have said, that it is not necessary ; for, by speaking 
so, he tacitly condemned a worship, to which he is 
highly devoted himself, and which therefore he must 
feel to be necessary. Besides, as the question he was 
asked was, whether the worship of saints is an article 
oi faith ; by answering that it is a practice, which has 
crept into the Church, but is not necessary, he attempted 
to elude the decision, which must be formed by those 
who think it wrong, namely, that it ought to be rejected. 
For if it be an article of faith of his Church (as un- 
doubtedly it is), those, who believe and know it to be 
contrary to the Word of God, whose first commandment 
is : Thou shalt have no other Gods but rne," that is 
to say : Thou shall invoke no other Beings, but me, 
cannot join in the worship of a Church, which commands 
and practises such an erroneous innovation. 

That the practice was early introduced into the 
Christian Church, there cannot be the least doubt : but, 
if antiquity was sufficient to sanction error, we should 
never have known truth, we should still be heathen, as 
our forefathers. The first traces of that veneration for 



RELICS. 



65 



the saints^ which is carried to such an excess in the 
countries where the Roman Church predominates, go 
up very likely near to the apostolic times, when a great 
number of Pagans had already embraced the true faith. 
It is probably co-eval with the first persecutions. When 
the martyrs w^ere dragged to torture and to death, a 
great excitement naturally prevailed among the members 
of the Christian community. All were eager to catch 
the last words of these intrepid confessors of the faith, 
to ask for their last jjrayers and to preserve something 
which had belonged to them. Accordingly their clothes 
were divided among the eager multitude : and as the 
martyrs w^ere generally some of the principal men 
among them, the greater was the desire of obtaining 
those precious remains or relics. 

These relics were at first kept as a mere remembrance, 
just as an autograph or something which has belonged 
to some great man, is kept at this day. But men did 
not stop at this tender remembrance of the champions 
of their faith. They erected oratories near or over their 
tombs, according to the ancient practice of the heathen 
world ; and the day of their death was set apart as a 
day of thanksgiving or feast. 

Though no doubt those days were appointed merely 
to render thanks to God for having strengthened his 
Church by the example of his martyrs, the excitement 
which they caused — the recollection of the miraculous 

E 



66 



INFLUENCE OF THE IMAGINATION. 



powers of Jesus Christ and his apostles, whose garments 
it had been sufficient at times for men to touch, in order 
to be healed — the belief that the blessed martyrs had 
received the same influence — all these considerations 
worked upon the lively imagination of a people naturally 
inclined to believe in the miraculous interfexence of 
God even in the least matters : so the power of healing 
diseases was insensibly attributed to those relics, which 
people began to carry about them as a preservative 
against evil, as well as to the sacred body of the saint, 
deposited in the shrine. 

It is impossible to say to w^hat extent such a belief 
did work upon a sensitive people: for the influence of 
the imagination is so great upon the nervous system, 
that there are many instances upon record, in which the 
<ieneral health or local diseases have been affected or 
even permanently benefited by it in highly nervous 
temperaments. The female constitution seems the 
most susceptible of this nervous influence. Also, it 
was principally upon females that cures were performed 
by Prince Hohenlohe's prayers about twenty years ago ; 
it was the same at the shrine of Dr. Paris, which 
obtained so high a repute in Paris, in the eighteenth 
century, (though on account of his being a Jansenist 
these cures were not acknowledged as miracles by the 
Jesuits and the strenuous supporters of Rome;) and it 
has always been so at the numberless places, which in 



FEMALE DEVOTEES. 



67 



all countries have long been famous for the performance 
of miraculous cures, on account of their possessing the 
bones of some saint, a celebrated image of the Virgin , 
or some part of the cross or of the crown of thorns, and 
even of the gannents of Christ. 

At present it is also chiefly upon females that 
mesmerism, whether real or imaginary, does accomplish 
its greatest effects. Dr. Elliotson has published a case 
of a young lady, who was subject to trances from disease, 
and of which he says he has succeeded in curing her„ 
Whoever has read the description of her ecstacies, her 
beautiful postures in praying, her exalted language, &Co 
when in that morbid state, cannot fail being struck with 
the resemblance which they bear to the narrative, written 
a few years ago by an English nobleman of the 
E static a di C alder o in Tyrol, a female devotee, whom 
he supposed' to be thrown into ecstacies by a miraculous 
powder, whose sublirnxO postures and supernatural 
conversations w^ith her confessor, who stood beside her, 
and had a complete command over her, created so great 
a sensation in that country that the inhabitants of distant 
parishes flocked by thousands in solemn processions 
with their clergy and banners at their head to the house 
of one, whom they supposed God had honoured with 
such high favours. Dr. Elliotson adds : Such is the 
force of imagination on the nervous system, that I am 
tempted to believe that those stigmata or marks of the 

E 2 



68 



SHRINES OF MARTYRS. 



sacred wounds in the hands and forehead of female 
devotees in the Roman Church, are not fictitious, 
but real." 

Those public resorts were at first limited to a few 
localities ; and the effects which were sometimes 
produced upon some excited individuals, were no doubt 
sincerely believed to be supernatural. But as fame did 
not fail to magnify these, as it has always done, these 
practices soon extended through the provinces of the 
East ; and every considerable place had the body of a 
martyr and some other relics. However as men could 
not be so stupid, as to believe that relics, whether bones 
or garments could possess any virtue of themselves, 
they must have attributed it to the merits of the saint, 
who reigned gloriously in heaven, and who still 
manifested the interest he took in his people, his former 
companions or their children by continuing to them his 
support and protection. Hence the transition from a 
belief in the miraculous efficacy of relics, into the 
invocation of the saint himself was perfectly natural. 
The consideration how a departed man could hear 
prayers never could enter into the mind of zealots, who 
believed his spirit to be present even with his bones and 
garments. The fear of offending God by paying 
divine homage to men (which the worship of saints 
unquestionably is) could not occur to a devotee who 
believed that his favourite patron had the whole of 



HEROES AND DEMI-GODS. 



69 



nature at his command. It was not till after the practice 
had crept into the Church, and had become a dogma, 
^ that learned doctors thought of establishing a distinction 
between the relative worship due to God, to the angels 
and to saints, under the name of latria, hyperdoulia 
and doulia. 

By latria is meant the supreme worship due to God 
alone ; by doulia^ the worship of the servants of God, 
as the term im.plies ; by hyperdoulia, a worship, holding 
an intermediate place between that due to God and to 
the saints, and which is the worship of the blessed virgin 
alone. Who does not see, that this is an imitation of 
the Gods, majortim et minorum gentium of pagan 
Rome ? 

It is not to be wondered at, that such abuses should 
have so early crept into the Church, when we consider 
the people, among whom they were established. They 
were the ancient votaries of a religion, whose worship 
consisted in outward forms, pomps, and ceremonies, who 
besides their general deities had all some local demi-god 
or hero, upon whose tomb or altar they were accustomed 
to offer sacrifices, and whose intercession was asked in 
all actions of life. Of this I will give you an instance 
taken from Herodotus — When the Greek chiefs had 
determined to come to a battle at Sakmis, they re- 
solved to invoke the Gods and to implore the help of 
the (Eacides. Accordingly having addressed their 



70 



PILGRIMAGES. 



prayers to ail the Gods, and invoked Ajax and Telamon, 
in the place where they were, they sent to (Egina, with 
like instructions to (Eacus, and to the CEacides." The 
Greeks sent to (Egina, because they thought that the 
help of (Eacus and his sons would be better secured, if 
the prayers and offerings were made upon the spot 
hallowed by their more immediate presence, as tombs 
were then believed to be. And this belief still con- 
tinued to be entertained by the descendents of the Greeks, 
after they had embraced Christianity. 

Hence arose those frequent pilgrimages which were 
made to Jerusalem, v>^hich had been hallowed by the 
foot-steps and death of Jesus. When by the establish- 
ment of Christianity as the favoured religion of the 
empire, Christians had free access to it, thousands of 
pilgrims flocked to Jerusalem and brought back from 
the place of the sepulchre, which tradition assigned as 
the tomb in which the body of the Saviour had been 
laid, a great quantity of dust, to which the virtue of 
healing diseases was attributed, and which the pilgrims 
sold at a great price on their return, as we are told by 
St. Augustine, the bishop of Hippo, who affirms that 
this dust VMS highly efficacious in dispelling diseases 
both of the body and mind, as well as evil spirits. 

This kind of pilgrimage is still continued, but chiefly 
by the Christians of the Eastern churches. Five or 
six sects have contended for the holy sepulchre, and now 



PASSION FOR KELICS. 



71 



each sect occiijDies a part, which has been assigned to it. 
The door is occupied by a guard of Turkish soldiers, 
not indeed to molest the pilgrims, but to keep the 
various sects in order, which, without this salutary check, 
would come to blows in the holy enclosure, as they 
often have done. But not one of those places which 
they pretend to have been the scene of the Saviour's 
sufferings bears the least mark of authenticity : on the 
contrary they all have the stamp of mere legendary tra- 
dition, as is asserted by De la Martine, in his Souvenirs 
d 'Orient, and ev^ery well informed modern traveller. 

But these pilgrimages were not limited to the tomb 
of Jesus Christ, neither was it on its account that they 
were first set on foot. Every province, every district 
had its tombs of more or less renown, to which the 
devotees resorted to make their offerings. When this 
practice had passed into the West, after the conversion 
of the barbarians, who had invaded the Roman empire, 
it was carried among them to the utmost bounds of 
extravagance. Bones and relics, tombs and churches, 
statues and images, seemed to absorb entirely the 
minds of an infatuated people. The churches became 
enriched by the contributions of the pious votaries, and 
many towns in Europe owe their rise entirely to the 
tomb of their tutelary Saint. Hence arose the eagerness 
of possessing those precious remains : hence the disputes 
between various localities, each of which pretended to 
have the true relics of the saint, whom they revered. 



CHAPTER VII 



" But the hour cometh and now is, when the true worshippers 
shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth, for the Father 
seeketh such to worship him." John iv. 23. 



It is painful to reflect upon such gross abuses, and 
one is naturally led to inquire how the religion of Christ, 
so pure, so spiritual, which so much banished all out- 
ward forms and ceremonies, which addressed itself so 
exclusively to the inward man, came to be loaded with 
so many accessories, which by degrees disfigured it and 
transformed it into a new kind of polytheism. 

Several reasons can be assigned for this change. 
First, the persuasion in which men were that the power 
of working miracles entrusted by Christ to his apostles 
was to continue in his Church for ever. Therefore the 
performance of miracles continued to be considered after 
the death of the apostles and of those upon whom they 



INTR()I>U0TION OF ABUSES, 



73 



had bestowed the same gifts, as the principal means of 
propagating the GospeL Hence the pretension to out- 
ward influence upon nature, which continue to be set 
up by the Greek and Roman Churches, which both 
allege as a proof of their orthodoxy. 

Second, of the numbers who embraced Christianity 
even in the first century, many were little imbued 
with its spirit, as we can see by the letter of Pliny to 
Trajan. He says that many of those that were brought 
before him denied that they were Christians, and others 
said that they had ceased to be so : they all offered 
incense to the gods and cursed Christ ; which, he adds, 
those who are really Christians can never be forced to 
do.''^ 

Third, the modes of conciliating the Pagans which 
were adopted by many bishops of various churches, by 
allowing among Christians the pomps and ceremonies, 
the processions and feasts of the heathen temples. 

I will give vou one instance of that which I here 
advance : it is that of Gregory Thaumaturgus, or the 
wonder-vv^orker. He was bishop of Neocgesarea, in 
Pontus, and died about the year 265 : therefore he 
lived in a time, when Christians were still exposed to 
be persecuted, when the sunshine of court favor did 
not yet allure men to conform oufivardly at least to 
the prevailing worship. 

* Quorum nihil cogi posse dicuntur. qui Sunt revera Christiani. 



74 GREGORY THAUMATURGUS. 

It is said in his life : When Gregory perceived that 
the foolish and ignorant multitude persisted in their 
worship of idols on account of sensual gratifications and 
pleasures, he permitted them to indulge themselves and 
give themselves up to joy in celebrating the memory of 
the holy martyrs, hoping that in process of time, they 
would return of their own accord to a more virtuous and 
regular course of life," 

His French biographers say : Son episcopat fut 
une suite non interrompue de prodiges, operes sur les 
etres sensibles et sur les insensibles : il fut le Dieii de 
la nature et le maitre des cceurs. Lorsqu'il monta sur 
le siege de Neocesaree, il ne trouva danscette ville que 
dix-sept Chretiens : se voyant pres de mourir, il n'y 
avait plus qu'un pareil nombre d'idolatres. Les Peres 
parlent de lui, comme d'un nouveau ]Mo"ise, d'un nouveau 
Paul."-^ 

It is no wonder that a population, who believed all 
nature to be under the influence of one man, who, 
besides the prodigies they ascribed to him, indulged 
them in their favourite displays, should have gone over 
to him. But such indulgences were highly detrimental 

* His episcopate was an tininteniiptecl series of prodigies, worked 
both upon sensible and insensible beings: lie was the God of 
nature, and the master of hearts. When he came to the See of 
Neocsesarea, he found in that city only seventeen Christians ; when 
he was near dying, there was no longer but an equal number of 
idolaters. The Fathers speak of him as of a new Moses, a new 
Paul. 



CORRUPTION OF CHRISTIANITY. 



75 



to the simple truths of Christianity ; and Gregory 
entertained a vain hope^ when he expected that the 
ignorant people, after they hecame more enlightened, 
should give up their favorite tenets. They might 
indeed cease to sport and to feast round the tomhs of 
the martyrs,"^ hut, as they were under the impression 
that these martyrs had taken the place of the demi-gods 
in the celestial hierarchy, they clung to this belief with 
the more tenacity as they thought they secured to 
themselves powerful intercessors with Jesus Christ. For 
it is important to remark here that as the belief in the 
efficacy of the intercession of saints increased, so the 
true character of Christ was overlooked by the greatest 
number of the Christian world. They no longer looked 
upon him, after the manner of the first Christians, as 
the only Mediator between God and man, as the only 
one whose merits they might plead at the throne of 
grace to obtain mercy : but they considered him as the 
awful judge, whose wrath they might appease by laying 
before him the great favours he had showed to his 
faithful servants, and by praying that through their 
merits and prayers they might obtain pardon and pro- 
tection. And in order the better to secure this Dro- 
tection, fervent prayers were afterwards addressed to the 

* We have still some remains of these sports and feasts in France 
and other countries on the festival day of the patron Saints of 
parishes, which is always kept on a Sunday. The people go to 
mass in the morning, and in the afternoon they assemble in a field 
near the Church, where they eat and drink, dance and indulge in 
all kinds of sports. 



76 



INTERCESSION OF SAINTS. 



saint, and offerings were laid before his shrine. This 
practice has continued to this day not only in the 
Roman Churchy but also in the Greek Church, in which 
the invocation of saints is perhaps carried to a still 
greater excess. 

This idea of intercession was borrowed from the 
custom, which prevailed among the ancients in civil 
matters. When people had law-suits or any favours 
to solicit, they tried to interest the judges in their 
behalf by oifering presents either to them or to those 
relations and friends, who were thought to possess an 
influence over them. It is for this reason that, when 
the worship of the blessed Virgin, which was introduced 
later than that of the martyrs, and was a natural conse- 
quence of it, had been fully established in the Church, 
she was considered as the most powerful intercessor 
with her divine Son, who, as a dutiful son, could refuse 
her nothing. In the mind of her votaries, she has 
become the mother of Christians, and as such she is 
invoked with all the fondness of children to a kind and 
affectionate mother. Hers is the true worship of the 
heart. To be placed under her protection is to be 
assured both of prosperity and salvation. 

But it is said, relics, images, and statues are not 
worshipped ; they are kept only to put us in remembrance 
of Jesus Christ, and his saints, and to excite devotion, 
though that devotion is not directed to these objects. 



IMAGES REALLY WORSHIPPED. 



77 



The answer to this is : Firsts they are an infraction 
of a most solemn and positive command, which no man, 
who believes that the Scri23tares were given by inspira- 
tion of God, can break without incm'ring the charge of 
disobedience to the law of God, who has said : Thou 
shalt not make to thyself any graven image, nor the 
likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or in 
the earth beneath, or in the water under the earth. Thou 
shalt not bow down to them, nor worship them." 

Second, affection is a feeling and not an operation 
of the intellect : it is blind : it does not reason. The 
object, that moves it, must and does naturally absorb it: 
begin to reason, and the emotion vanishes. Look at 
the little girl coaxing her doll, pressing it to her bosom. 
The doll excites in her the same emotion, which her 
sister or mother would : and while the feeling lasts, she 
loves her doll. Let the most intellectual, the most 
spiritualized man, who is fond of praying before an 
image, analyse his feelings, if he can, when he is 
really moved ; he will find that the image commands a 
much greater share of them, than he is aware of. 

Besides images are consecrated ; crucifixes, &c., are 
blessed, have indulgences attached to them and are 
worn as a preservative against evil. There must be a 
virtue in that consecration, or their is none. If there 
be none, the consecration, the blessing, and the aspersion 
of holy water are an useless piece of mummery : if 



78 



ARGUMENTS OF IDOLATERS. 



there be any, then the image possesses a holy quality, 
which makes it resemble very much the statues or the 
little household gods of the Pagans. We accuse the 
ancients of having been idolaters : if they were present 
among us, they would deny the charge. They would 
deny that the statuary or carver had the power of 
making their gods. These they would say, only make 
the images, and when the images have been duly conse- 
crated by our priests, the virtue, the spmt of the Gods 
enters into them, and it is that virtue, it is that spirit 
that we worship. Also the philosopher Olympus of 
Alexandria said to the Pagans under Theodosius, who 
had ordered the destruction of images : The statues 
of the gods are but perishable images, the eternal 
intelligences, which dwelt within them, have withdrawn 
to the heavens." It is very evident, that such must have 
been their opinion, or else there would have been as 
many Jupiters, for instance, as there were statues, which 
represented him. 

Afev>^ years ago, I was telling my countryman Abbe S. 
(our old friend, whom you still recollect,) one evening 
that he slept at our house: Abbe, "I have long been an 
iconoclast. If I had the power of doing it, I would 
remove from our Churches all images and statues ; for 
they lead to so much abuse, they absorb so much the 
feelings of the people, that it is nothing short of 
idolatry/'— " Halte la, moo ami," cried he, you are 



PLEA FOR MODERN IMAGE-WORSHIP. 



79 



mistaken^ for I know better than you, and have had 
more opportunities of observing than you have, I have 
: often seen some of my parishioners embrace the statue 
of a saint and bestow upon it the most lively marks of 
affection. If I told one of them: ^my friend^ do you 
know what you are doing ? this a mere stone : you 
must not show so much affection to it." The answer 
invariably was : ' Oh, I know. Monsieur L'Abbe, that 
this stone cannot hear me : but my prayers are directed 
to the Saint, who is in heaven, whom this stone re- 
presents.' So added, the Abbe triumphantly, you see 
that they know very well what they are about." 

No doubt they do, when they merely look on, or 
coldly reason with a stranger : but when the internal 
feeling of devotion is excited, the material object placed 
before their eyes not only warms the devotion, but it 
entirely attracts and absorbs it : they cannot figure to 
themselves any other object, but that which they actually 
see. If we add to this, that looking on an image or 
istatue, saying so many prayers before it, in various 
postures, wearing a medal or crucifix, kissing them, 
pressing them to our bosoms, bowing our knees before 
them, &c., are so many means recommended and prac- 
tised not only to excite the mind to devotion, but to 
secure and obtain the favour sought for; can we imagine 
any other ways of worship, used by our heathen fore- 
fathers ? Unless it be said that they believe that the 



80 



CAPTIOUS EXCUSES. 



wood or stone was actually the deity whicli they 
worshipped, and not a representation of some invisible 
power. Which I maintain is a foul libel upon their 
common sense. Human nature is the same in all ages 
and countries. 

But you have been told these are abuses which have 
crept into the Church, which are not sanctioned by its 
authority. It has been urged upon us, that we may 
be very good Catholics, (meaning of course Roman 
Catholics) without worshipping images and relics or 
even praying to saints, because the invocation of saints 
is a practice, which has crept into the Church and is not 
necessary. We ask not whether it be necessary, but 
whether it be right. We maintain that it is wrong in 
principle, injurious in practice, contrary to the word and 
express command of God, and opposed to the worship 
of the early Christian Church. We say that it is an 
article of faith in the Roman Church, that veneration is 
due to relics and images, and that it is wholesome 
(salutare) to invoke the saints as intercessors, and no one 
can deny that the practices which we reprobate, as in- 
jurious to God, are suffered or recommended by the 
clergy. 

By the second decree of the 25th session of the 
council of Trent, De invocatione, veneratione et Re- 
iiquiis Sanctorum et sacris imaginibus, it is declared 
that those who deny that the saints reigning with 



PRAYING TO THE SAINTS OBLIGATORY, 81 

Christ ought to be invoked, or who assert that no 
veneration and honour are due to the relics of the saints, 
^iid it is useless to keep the memorials of the saints, in 
order to obtain their help (atque eorum opis impetrandae 
causa Sanctorum memorias frustra frequentari) think 
impiously (impie sentire) and are to be absolutely or 
entirely condemned or damned (omnino damnandos 
esse.) Though this condemnation of the Fathers of 
the Church is sufficiently awful, yet there are no doubt, 
some Roman Catholics, who, in their private devotions, 
do not pray to the saints, and perhaps would even think it 
wrong to do it : but is not this on their part a tacit con- 
demnation of their own Church ? However they cannot 
perform the three most solemn acts of their religion, 
without having previously prayed to the saints : they 
cannot go to confession, hear mass, and receive com- 
munion, unless they repeat the confiteor, or have it 
repeated for them. I need not notice besides the 
various parts of the mass, in which the merits and in- 
tercession of the saints are mentioned as the means of 
obtaining God's favour and j)rotection : therefore it is 
quite futile for such people to say, that the invocation 
of saints is not necessary, or that they abstain from it. 

The fact is, that men are so little struck with that 
which they are used to, that they will sincerely deny 
that they do a thing which they practice every day. 
It is true, that in this country the worship of the saints 



82 PRACTISED BY ALL ROMAN CATHOLICS* 

is kept in the back ground as much as possible^ because 
it is a Protestant country ; and any one, who has been 
brought up on the continent, cannot help being struck 
with it at first. But it is undeniable that in their 
private devotions, the English and Irish, and especially 
the clergy, are as much attached to it, particularly to 
the worship of the Virgin, as they are on the continent. 
I venture to assert that no priest, above all, not any of 
those connected with the Jesuits, would dare to go on 
a journey, or would consider himself safe, without having 
Erst said the Litany of the blessed Virgin. 



CHAPTEE VIII. 



Verily, verily 1 say unto jou, He that heareth my word, and 
T3elieyeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not 
come into condemnation ; but is passed from death unto life."' 
John v. 24. 



But the invocation of saints and the warship of relics 
and images are not the only abuses which have crept 
into the Church. 

The belief that man does not cease to exist in another 
state after death, has been one of the fundamental 
dogmas of all religions, 

111 the religions of the East, as it was taught that the 
souls of men were emanations from the great soul of 
the universe, so it was believed that they were absorbed 
into it again^ when they were loosened from the corrupt 
matter in which they were enslaved. But as the 
Orientals considered matter the principle of evil^ tiiej 

T 2 



84 



TRANSITORY STATE. 



thought that no soul was in a fit state to be re-united 
to the deity, unless during its stay in its earthly habita- 
tion, the body had been subjected to austere mortifica- 
tions and denied all luxurious indulgence. Hence arose 
the doctrine of metempsychosis or transmigration of 
souls from one body to another, until they were sufh- 
ciently purified to return to the source from which they 
first issued. Hence arose also those extraordinary 
mortifications, which all men, who aspired to a sanctity 
of life, imposed upon themselves, which still characterize 
the worshippers of Brama and of Budha, and which 
were imitated by the Jewish, Christian, and Mahometan 
ascetics. 

Others believed that as few souls, on leaving the body 
were sufficiently pure to enjoy the immediate presence 
of the deity, the greatest number were kept in a separate 
state, in which they were purified by a certain fire, 
until they had been made clean. The Jews are sup- 
posed to have imbibed some notions of this doctrine in 
Chaldsea. It is certain that it was taught by the 
Platonic Schools of Alexandria, in Egypt ; and the 
frequent intercourse with Alexandria, where the Jews 
abounded under the Ptolemies, spread those notions 
among a great part of the Jews, especially among the 
influential sect of the Pharisees, who held so many tradi- 
tions, which have been compiled in the Talmud, which is 
still held in great veneration by the present Jews. This 



DOCTRINE OF PURGATORY. 



85 



doctrine also crept into the Christian Church, after the 
philosophers of the Platonic school, to which many of 
the Fathers of the second and third century belonged, 
had introduced some of Plato's notions into the doctrines 
of the Church. 

It is very certain that there is not one passage in all 
the New Testament which can be fairly construed into 
the doctrine of Purgatory. In all the ceremonies en- 
joined to the Jews upon so many occasions in the Old 
Testament, there is not the slightest allusion of any^ 
sacrifice or offering being made for the dead. On the 
contrary, we have positive proofs that such notions were 
contrary to the law^ and highly displeasing to God. For 
w^e read in the 106th Psalm, 28. They joined 
themselves to Baal-peor and ate the offerings of the 
dead. Thus they provoked him (the Lord) to anger 
with their own inventions ; and the plague was great 
among them." The only passage, which the Roman 
Catholic priests have in favour of the opinion, occurs 
in the xii. chapter of the second book of Maccabees, 
43rd verse of the Vulgate translation, which is the only 
one authorised by them. The passage runs thus and 
is certainly very plain : ^'Et facta collatione duodecim 
millia drachmas misit (Judas) Jerosolymam ofFerri pro 
peccatis mortuorum Sacrijicium, bene et religiose de 
resurrectione cogirans, (Nisi enim eos, qui ceciderunt 
(prselio) resurrecturos speraret, superfluum videretur 



86 



THE APOCRYPHAL BOOKS. 



orare pro mortuis.) Et quia considerabat^ qiiod IiL 
qui cum jDietate dormitionem acceperant, optimam 
haberent repositam gratiam. Sancta ergo et salubris est 
cogitatio pro defunctis exorare, ut a peccatis solvantur." 
Or as it is in the English translation : And also in that 
he perceived that there was a gi'eat favour laid up for 
those that died godly, it was an holy and good thought. 
Whereupon he made a reconciliation for the dead, that 
they might be delivered from their sins." 

But these books are apocryphal, which means con- 
cealed or obscure, without authority. The fir&t book of 
Maccabees is said even by Roman Catholic writers to 
have been written in the time of Hircan, the last of the 
Asmoneans about 60 years before Christ, that is to say, 
one hundred years after the events, which it pretends to 
relate. The second, which contains this famous passage, 
is still posterior and is said to be but an abridgment of 
a larger work, which had been compiled by one Jaso, a 
Cyrenaean. By many they are thought to be posterior 
to the Christian sera. The passage in question was 
evidently inserted by one of those who maintained the 
resurrection of the dead, which occasioned so much 
division among the Jews about the time of our Saviour 
and his apostles, iu order to prove and support his 
favourite opinion, as the insertion of these words. For 
if he had not hoped that they that were slain should 
have risen again, it had been superfluous and vain to 



THE COUNCIL OF TRENT. 



87 



pray for the dead," clearly shows. — The Jews of this 
day do not believe in a purgatory, therefore they do not 
pray for the dead.^ They only hold the opinion which 
had crept in among their ancestors, and which was 
nothing but the vulgar superstition generally prevailing 
in the heathen world, namely, that the souls of the de- 
parted do not get to their final place of rest, till their 
bodies have been buried. Therefore they bury their 
dead as soon after death as possible. 

These books are regarded as spurious by the Jews : 
they were not less so by the early Christian writers who 
mention only 22 books of the Old Testament as canoni- 
cal. Even Jerome, the celebrated translator of the 
Vulgate, says : " The Church reads the books of Judith, 
Tobias and the Maccabees, but does not receive them 
among the canonical Scriptures." 

Yet the Council of Trent ordered these and some 
others to be received as canonical against the judgment 
of all antiquity and the explicit declaration of their own 
translator, w^hose only version of Scriptures they allow to 
be read, merely because they favoured some of those 
tenets which had crept into the Church, and which they 
felt the canonical books could not substantiate. I have 
often heard it stated from the foot of the altar, that 
Jesus Christ never reproved the Jews for this doctrine ; 

* Many Jews however, formerly believed that the souls of the 
dead wandered about in the air for the space of one year, during 
which period they used to pray for their rest 



88 



SILENCE OF JESUS CHRIST. 



therefore it was concluded that he approved of it»— We 
have a right to construe this silence into a proof that it 
was not openly advocated or even known in the time of 
our Saviour, and moreover that it is false, for had it heen 
a true doctrine, in his discourses with the Sadducees, 
concerning the resurrection, such a prominent subject 
could not have failed to be mentioned. But, supposing 
that such a dogma had been generally believed, (which 
the opinions of the Jews in all subsequent ages suffi- 
ciently prove not to have been the case,) there can be 
no doubt that Jesus Christ did condemn such a tradition 
of exotic origin in his general reproof of the Jews for 
preferring their traditions to the law of God, as when he 
said, In vain do they worship me, teaching for 
doctrines the commandments of men. — For laying 
aside the commandments of God, ye hold the traditions 
of men, as the washing of pots and cups, and many other 
such like things ye do" — (Mark vii. 7.) Again, ''Full 
well ye reject the commandment of God, that you may 
keep your own tradition." As the words and precepts of 
our Saviour were not only applicable to the times, when 
he was upon earth, but were to endure to the end of time, 
so his rebukes had an equal reference to the ages, that 
were to come. 

We see by the preface of Jerome to the Pentateuch, 
that in his time the practice of seeking for authority in 
the apocryphal books did already prevail, since he says : 



DOCTRINE TAUGHT BY JESUS CHRIST. 89 



Quod multi ignorantes apocryphorum deliramenta 
sectantur, et Hiberas ncenias libris authenticis praeferunt. 

Which many being ignorant of (namely where the 
quotations on which they rested their opinions were to 
be found) follow after the extravagancies of the Apo- 
crypha, and prefer idle stories to the authentic books." 
— Such has always been the tendency of the human 
mind. Therefore the apostle Paul cautions us against 
it, when in his epistle to the Colossians he warns us : 
Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy 
and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the 
rudiments of the world, and not after Christ. For in 
him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily. 
And ye are complete in him, which is the head of all 
principality and power. And you being dead in your 
sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, has he 
quickened together with him having forgiven you all 
your trespasses." 

Jesus Christ had taught in the most explicit terms 
that the souls of good men should receive everlasting 
rewards and those of bad men everlasting punish- 
ments : — And these shall go away into everlasting 
punishment ; but the righteous into life eternal." 
(Mat. XXV. 46.) 

The heathens believed that none but the souls of 
heroes, of austere and wise philosophers, and of those 
who had been initiated into the sacred mysteries as- 



90 



DOCTRIXE OF THE HEATHENS. 



cended after death into the mansions of light and 
felicity : whereas the souls of common men weighed 
down hy the lust of the flesh, and defiled hy their suh- 
servdency to corrupt matter, either wandered ahout in 
an empty space, which separated them from the regions 
of life, or were plunged into a certain fire from which 
they were not permitted to emerge, till they had heen 
purified from their corruption. Quia non funditus 
omnes corporeee excedimt pestes."^ Hence sacrifices 
used to be made upon tombs, to obtain a state of rest for 
the souls of the departed : and Sacella or chapels were 
consecrated to the God of death, Ditis sacraria diri, 
in which, as well as before the altars of Saturn tapers 
were lighted, and oscilla or masks, which we call 
in French Tetes de mort, were offered during ex- 
piations as substitutes for the human victims. It is 
in imitation of this custom, that, after the Christians 
had adopted the dogma of praying for the dead they 
continued this supplication which the heathens addressed 
to the God of death at funerals : Requiem oeternam 
dona eis domine, et lux perpetua luceat eis, and made 
a frequent use of it in the funeral services and masses 
for the dead. It is also from the same cause that 
white skulls and crossed bones painted on black cloth 
with a profusion of lighted tapers are still used at the 
funerals of those whose friends can afford for their being 
put up in Churches on the occasion. 

* Macrobius. 



FEAST OF THE PURIFICATIOX. 



91 



Again as an emblem of purification^ tapers used to be 
sent about to the different families at the feast of 
Saturn. Inde mos per Saturnalia missitandis cereis 
coepit." This practice of sending about tapers and of 
walking in procession with tapers in their hands is still 
continued by the Roman Catholics on Candlemas day, 
or the feast of Purification. To render the tradition 
more complete, it is now, as it was then, the custom of 
lighting these tapers, (which of course have been 
blessed by the priest, as they used to be by the priest 
of Saturn) only when any one of the family is either 
dead or dying. 

Here is what Pacificus Barker, in his book called 
'^The devout Christian's Companion for Holy days," 
says on this subject. — "Cardinal Baronius affirms that 
Pope Gelasius, who governed the Holy See from the 
year 492 to 496, gave beginning to it, in order to abolish 
all remains of the Lvpercalia or feasts of Saturn, 
which were in part observed by the heathen Romans in 
his time, that b}- the holiness of the Christian mysteries 
might be effaced the profanation of the Pagans." This 
declaration will give you a clue to nearly all the 
ceremonies, which were gradually introduced in the 
Church, and to which succeeding ages have attached so 
much importance. 

The apostles, by their preaching, as is to be seen in 
the Acts, taught as the only fundamental doctrine, the 



92 



DOCTRINE OF THE APOSTLES. 



complete redemption of man by the death of Jesus, and 
in all the epistles it is urgently inculcated that there is 
no other name, by which men can be saved ; and there- 
fore any man's works can be of no avail to another. St. 
Peter, in his first epistle, says — " If ye call on the Father, 
who ivithout respect of persons judgeth according to 
every man's ivorks, pass the time of your sojourning 
here in fear : for as much as ye know that ye w^ere not 
redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, 
from your vain conversation by tradition from your 
fathers ; but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a 
lamb without blemish and without spot. Being born 
again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by 
the w^ord of God, which liveth and abideth for ever. 
For all flesh is as grass, and the glory of man as the 
Jloicer of grass.'' 

St. Paul particularly insists upon this point in many 
parts of his epistles : giving thanks unto the Father, 
who has made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance 
of the saints in light : who has delivered us from the 
power of darkness, and has translated us into the 
kingdom of his dear Son ; in whom we have redemption 
through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins. For it 
pleased the Father, that in him should all fulness 
dwell : and (having made peace through the blood of 
his cross,) by him, to reconcile all things unto himself 
by him, I say, whether they be things on earth or 
things in heaven — (Col. i. 20.) 



DOCTRINE OF THE APOSTLES. 



93 



And as it were in anticipation of those pretensions, 
that were to be set up by those who have declared 
themselves the only true expounders and teachers of the 
gospel, through w^hom and with whom alone men could 
obtain the blessing of God and be saved, he says — But 
now the righteousness of God without the law is mani- 
fested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets ; 
even the righteousness which is by faith of Jesus Christ 
unto all and upon all them that believe ; for there is 
no diffei^ence : for all have sinned and come short of 
the glorij of God. Being justified freely by his grace 
through the redemption, that is in Christ Jesus : whom 
God has set forth to be a propitiation through faith in 
his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission 
of sins that are past, through the forbearance of 
God" — (Rom. iii. 21.) " For Christ is the end of the 
law for righteousness to every one that believeth'' — 
(Rom. X. 4.) 

After insisting that without faith it is impossible to 
please God, that we are justified freely by his grace 
through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, he 
exclaims — " Where is boasting then ? It is excluded. 
By what law ? Of works ? Nay ; but by the law of 
faith" — (Rom. iii. 27.) And to preclude our trusting 
in the merits of men, he says — The Lord knoweth the 
thoughts of the wise, that they are vain. Therefore 
let no man glory in men — (1 Cor. iii. 20.") Judge 



94 



BELIEF OF THE EARLY CHRISTIANS. 



iiotliing before the time, until the Lord come, who 
will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, 
and will make manifest the counsels of the heart: 
and then shall every man have praise of God, What hast 
thou that thou didst not receive ? now if thou didst re- 
ceive it, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received 
it ?" — (1 Cor.iv, 5.) Wherefore henceforth know we no 
man after the flesh ; yea, though we have known Christ 
after the flesh, yet now henceforth we know him no more. 
Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature-, 
€ld things are passed away : behold all things are 
become new. We pray you in Christ's stead, be ye 
reconciled to God, For he has made him to be sin for 
us, who knew no sin ; that we might be made the 
righteousness of God in him" — (2 Cor. v.) 

It is very certain, that the early Christians, who had 
been taught by the Apostles and their disciples knew 
nothing of Purgatory, hoped for salvation and a glorious 
i^esuxrection through the merits of Christ alone, and 
believed that '''God was in Christ, reconciling the world 
imto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them." 
But that such an opinion was early entertained by many 
of the people and encouraged by some of the learned, 
who were exceedingly fond of the philosophy of Plato, 
and tried every way to reconcile it with the Holy 
.Scriptures, there is not the least doubt. But the idea 
#f a Purgatory, such as is now entertained by the 



THEIR PUNERAL RITES. 



95 



Church of Rome, was developed by degrees, as was 
every other dogma of hmiian invention. It seems to 
have been posterior to the worship of the martyrs, 
probably to the custom of addressing prayers to them ; 
but most certainly it had crept into the Church, before 
it was imagined that the superabundant merits of the 
saints and the blessed Virgin might be beneficially 
applied to the relief of the dead. 

It is very evident that the funeral rites of the early 
Christians greatly differed from those of the Roman 
Church, at the present day. They bore the impress of 
the idea then prevailing, that the Christian, the believer 
in Jesus was immediately admitted into the glory of 
God. Indeed this is evident in the songs of joy, which 
then accompanied the funeral service. It is true that 
these ceremonies degenerated in many places into 
festivities, which were severely censured by some 
bishops in the third and fourth centuries: but they 
show the conti'ast between the service which was after- 
wards introduced, w^hen the idea of a purgatory had 
become a fixed dogma. All the prayers now became of 
a deprecatory nature ; they asked for eternal rest, 
(Requiem seternam dona) instead of expressing the 
confidence that those who die in Christ are become 
partakers of his glory : " For by one offering he hath per- 
fected for ever them that are sanctified" — (Heb. x. 14.) 
That such was the confidence of the ancient Catholic 



96 



JOYFUL SONGS AT FUNERALS, 



Churcli^ those parts of the old ritual, such as the epistle 
and the gospel, which have been retained in spite of the 
new opinion in the mass for the dead, ahundtotly 
testify. 

Macrobius is thought to make allusion to the custom 
of the Christians of his time, when he says : Mortuos 
quoque ad Sepulturam prosequi oportere cum cantu 
plurimarum gentium vel region um instituta sanxerunt, 
persuasione hac ; quia post corpus animse ad originem 
dulcedinis musicse, id est, ad coelum redire credantur ; 
because joyful songs still prevailed among them, in his 
age, that is in the fourth century. And a passage of 
Jerome is quoted to the same effect, when he says in 
the funeral of Fabiola (in funere Fabiolae:) Sonabant 
psalmi et aurata templorum reboans in sublime quatiebat 
aleluia. Psalms were sung and the allelujah resounding 
on high shook the gilded ceilings of the temples.'' 
Canebatur aleluia quasi congratulantium quod evolasset 
ad coelum. They sang allelujah, as rejoicing that she 
had flown up into heaven. It is true, that, so early as 
the end of the second century, prayers began to be 
addressed for the dead in the Church, But these 
prayers had no reference to a middle state of suffering, 
to which the souls who died in faith were condemned 
for those sins w^hich they had not expiated, as was after- 
wards taught in the Western Church. 

They originated in a belief, which prevailed in the 



PRAYERS FOR THE DEAD. 



97 



East, and the seeds of which were so early mixed with 
the doctrine of the Gospel, that the souls after death, 
though happy, were not yet advanced to the higher 
mansions of glory ; and it was thought hy many that the 
prayers of the faithful might obtain for the souls of 
those, who were in a state of bliss a higher degree of 
glory, than they enjoyed. So in the commemoration 
for the dead, prayers and sujoplications were offered for 
all the Saints that had died in faith ; as is to be seen 
in all the old Eastern Liturgies. "Be mindful, Lord, 
of all thy saints, voachsafe to remem^ber all thy saints, 
which have pleased thee from the beginning, our holy 
fathers, the patriarchs, prophets, apostles, martyrs, 
confessors, preachers, evangelists, and all the souls of 
the just, which have died in the faith ; and especially 
the holy, glorious, the evermore Virgin Mary, the 
Mother of God, and St. John the forerunner, kc.^ 

Secondly, they had reference to the resurrection ; 
and this is the sense oriven to that famous passage by the 
writer of the book of Maccabees, in which no allusion 
whatever is made to a middle state of suffering, or a 
purgatory fire after death. Judas Maccabeus having 
found under the coats of every one that was slain, things 
consecrated to the idols of the Jamnites, (which they 
wore about them as scapularies, are now worn by many 
Roman Catholics) is said to have sent money to 
* See Archbishop Usher's Answer, &o., p, 171. 

G 



98 



REFEEENCE TO THE RESURRECTION, 



Jerusalem to make a '' sin offering ;" which is rendered 
in the Vulgate, to help the belief in a purgatory, by 

for the sins of the dead." It does not prove at ail that 
Judas ordered this sin offering" to be made for the 
dead ; but it implies rather, that it was to obtain pardon 
for the living, according to the sense in which sin 
offerings were made, because the sin had been com- 
mitted by some of the Jewish j)8opie. In further 
support of this interpretation, it is said above, " that ail 
men betook themselves to prayer and besought God 
that the sin committed might be wholly put out of re- 
membrance." But the writer of this book, anxious to 
prove the resurrection, which so many denied, construes 
this act of Judas into the acknowledgment of a final 
resurrection ; so after mentioning the fact he immediately 
adds For if he had not hoped that they that were 
slain should have risen again, it had been superfluous 
and vaiu to pray for the dead." 

This practice of praying for a happy resurrection was 
early introduced. Though Christians were much divided 
in their opinions whether prayers benefitted the dead or 
not ; yet they thought that they testified thereby, that 
those who had departed, were still alive in the Lord — 
and they offered supplications that they might partake 
of the glorious resurrection, as is expressed in this 
prayer: — God, who art the Creator and Maker 
of all things, grant unto us, vfho make request unto thee^ 



THE EASTERN CHUECHES. 



99 



that the spirit of our brother, who is loosed from the knot 
of his body, may be presented in the blessed resurrection 
of thy saints."^ 

It is in this sense that prayers are still offered for the 
dead in the Greek and all the Eastern Churches, which 
have never admitted the dogma of Purgatory, as was 
expressed by the Greek deputies to the Council of 
Florence, when being so hard pressed by the Turks, 
they were ready to submit to any thing in order to 
obtain help from the pope and the Western powers. 

^ purgatory fire, which is temporal and shall at last 
have an end, neither have we received from our doctors, 
neither do we know that the Church of the East does 
maintain, "f 

But in the fifth and sixth centuries, when a great 
number of the clergy and people in the Western Church 
continued to deviate further and further from the 
primitive simplicity of the first Churches, when the 
gorgeous pomps and ceremonies of the Pagan ritual had 
become the necessary accessories of the Christian service, 
those few only, who had practised uncommon austerities 
and had imposed upon themselves extraordinary mor- 
tifications, and by these had gained to themselves a 
great reputation of sanctity, were considered worthy to 
be admitted into the heavenly regions. Their superior 

* See Archbishop Usher's Answer, p. ]92. Ex. Cass. oper. 
t Id. 166. 

G 2 



iOO 



EXPIATORY SACRIFICES. 



virtue, their thorough contempt of every gratification of 
sense had raised them so high in public estimation, that 
they took the piace^ in the minds of men, of the heroes 
and great men of the ancient heathens. The generality 
of men were looked upon as too polluted by their sins, 
to appear in the divine presence : therefore they were 
thought to be doomed to expiate their sins in a certain 
fire for some indefinite period, according to the enormity 
of their offences, until their souls were sufficiently 
purified, to enjoy the glories of heaven. 

As the Pagans had thought that expiatory sacrifices 
were to be made for the dead, so when this new dogma 
had been engrafted upon the Christian doctrines. 
Christians in their turn believed that prayers and 
sacrifices would be of great benefit to the dead, to 
shorten the period of their punishment and obtain their 
release from the fires of purgatory. It is true that 
sacrifices had ceased and Jesus Christ had declared 
that he came from the Father, that he might die and 
ofifer himself as an atoning sacrifice for the sins of 
mankind. And the apostle Paul, in explaining this 
great mystery to the Hebrews, had said, that " we are 
sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus 
Christ once for all," therefore no sacrifice could be 
ofifered any more. And every priest standeth daily 
ministering and offering often-times the same sacrifices, 
which can never take away sins. But this man, after 



Christ's sacrifice tor sin. 



101 



he had offered one sacrince for sin, for ever sat down 
at the right hand of God : From henceforth expecting 
till his enemies he made his foot-stooL For by one 
offering he has perfected for ever them that are 
sanctified." Notwithstanding these explicit declarations, 
the Sacrament which Jesus Christ had instituted on the 
evening before he w^as betrayed, in remembrance of the 
sacrifice of his body and blood, which he was about to 
accon]plisli, and through which all worthy partakers, 
all true believers were to have the spiritual blessings of 
his body and blood imparted to them for the remission 
of their sins, w as erroneously turned into a new sacrifice, 
which a priest could offer both for the living and the 
dead. Nor w^as this sufficient. The saints, who by 
their extraordinary mortifications, their life of prayer 
and of good wxn-ks, had gained so miicn praise and 
obtained so much favour, the apostles, the iiiartyrs, and 
the blessed virgin, who, as a mother must ha- e exercised 
an unbounded influence over her divine Son, were 
thought to be possessed of such a neper-abundance 
of meritvS, which they did not want, that the only ap- 
plication, which could be made of them, was to offer 
them together with the abundant merits of Christ foi 
the redemption of souls doomed to expiate their sins in 
purgatory. Such deplorable deviations from the word 
of truth show clearly the errors into which men are apt 
to fall, when they abandon the only sure guide, which 



102 



NO MERITS IN MEN. 



lias been left to us, namely the holy Scriptures. For in 
them we are expressly told that we are all unprofitable 
servants, that there is none righteous, no, not one. " For 
by grace are ye saved through faith, and not that of 
yourselves : it is the gift of God : not of works, lest 
any man should boast. For we are his workmanship, 
created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God 
has before ordained that we should walk in them. 
For through him we both have access by one spirit unto 
the Father." How clearly do these words disprove the 
new invention of the meritorious works of men, and hov.^ 
completely do they destroy the super-structure, which 
has been erected upon them. 



CHAPTEE IX. 



But this man, because he contiiiueth ever, hath an unchange- 
able priesthood. Wherefore he is able also to save them to the 
uttermost that come unto God by him, seeing that he ever liveth to 
make intercession for them." Hebrews vii. 24, 25. 



But the merits of the saints were not only applied to 
the benefit of the dead ; they were made also available 
to the living. 

In the three first centuries of the Church, when 
Christians were fiercely persecuted, sometimes all over 
the empire, and oftener in various provinces, according 
to the caprice of the governors or the ill-will of the 
people, many were brought before the magistrates and 
ordered to offer incense before the images of the gods 
and that of the emperor. Those who refused were 
punished with death or various tortures : but many did 
comply and were set free. Some of these, however, 



104 



PUBLIC PENANCES. 



bitterly repented of their weakness and apostacy, and 
sought reconciliation with the Church. 

In order to check this dereliction of duty in the 
moment of trials and to punish the scandal arising from 
it, the rulers of the various Churches had thought fit to 
establish a severe discipline. Therefore they obliged 
those, who had given scandal by sacrificing to idols, or 
by any notorious crime, to submit to a hard mode of 
life, v/hich was imitated from the Therapeut^ of Egypt 
and other Eastern ascetics. They v/ere not allowed to 
go beyond the door of the church, they were obliged to 
wear hair-cloth, to cover themselves with ashes, to fast, 
all which were signs of mourning among the Jews and 
other Eastern nations. They gave alms and submitted 
themselves to the most humiliating degradations. 

This was called doing penance. This penance 
lasted often a long time, and was sometimes imposed for 
a whole life. But on certain occasions, such as on an 
impending persecution, or at the request of a martyr 
belonging to the same Church, this penance was 
remitted : then the penitents were re-admitted in the 
body of the Church, and such a re-admission was 
called an indulgence, or an act of kindness. It is very 
evident that such punishments or penances were a mere 
matter of discipline, of order. They had been judged 
necessary, in order that they might act as a check upon 
others, by impressing upon them and upon the penitents 



THEIR EFFECT, 



105 



themselves an awful sense of the enormity of such 
faults. 

If we were to inqmre hoAv far such chastisements had 
a salutary effect^ and were really consonant with the 
doctrine of faith in the atonement of Jesus Christ, how 
far they produced that " godly sorrow which worketh 
repentance unto salvation" — (2 Cor. vii.) we should find 
that they were calculated to mislead men hy keeping 
them from ofiendlng more through the dread of these 
outward penances than the fear of displeasing God. It 
is very certain, that they did not prevent apostacy in 
the moment of trial, any more than public executions 
deter criminals from offending against the law ; and the 
Vvritings of Jerome and other writers of his time, who 
bitterly complain of the vices of the clergy and people, 
are witnesses how ineffectual they had been in prevent- 
ing the corruption of morals, w^th which the Christians 
were now infected. Their disuse, when the clergy had 
become most powerful, shews their utter uselessness. 
But the evils, which they inflicted on the Church, have 
been more durable and injurious to genuine Christianity. 
They tended to remove confidence in the mercies of a 
Saviour, who is always ready to receive a contrite and 
penitent heart. They must have lessened faith in the 
complete atonement of Christ's sacrifice, and if they did 
not bring complete despair (as, no doubt, they must 
have done upon certain tem.peraments,) they led to 



106 THE DOCTRINE OF GOOD WORKS. 



self-confidence by making men believe that by such 
austerities they atoned for their sins, and obtained 
God's favour. 

It is to these self-imposed or compulsory penances, that 
is to be ascribed the origin of the doctrine of good works, 
which has completely altered Christianity from its original 
institution, and which has led to so many abuses in the 
subsequent ages of the Church. Though it may now 
appear stripped of its grossest principles, nevertheless, 
it misleads ever}'- Roman Catholic, even in the most 
important and awful of his religious acts. Besides, it 
continues to blind the minds of millions of men, by 
making them busy about insignificant trifles. It gives 
power, awe, and virtue to a medal, an image, or a toy, 
as soon as a pope, a bishop, or even a priest, by his 
blessing and the sprinkling of holy water, has attached 
some indulgence to these objects, that is to say has 
endowed them with the remission of so many days or 
years of penance, either in this life or in the next. 

But these public punishments for apostacy naturally 
ceased with the persecutions, and the general admission 
of the populations into the body of the Church. Then 
by an ingenious legal fiction, though temporal punish- 
ments were no longer imposed, yet they were considered 
necessary for every kind of sin, as an infraction of the 
law : therefore, if they were not suffered in this life, 
they were to be undergone after death. As the priests 



INDULGENCES. 



107 



have the power of remitting sins^ they said ; so they 
must have also the power of remitting the chastisements^ 
which those sins deserve. Then indulgence or free 
pardon was still " to be dispensed by the Church, 
according to its wisdom or good pleasure : and this 
indulgence was made to depend upon various meritorious 
acts, such as giving alms, building churches, visiting 
the shrine of a saint, receiving communion, giving 
money to the clergy, making wars upon infidels or 
heretics, as in the Crusades against the Saracens and 
the Albigenses, &c. Many cases of this last description 
were of course only occasional : and at present, the 
principal ordinary means of gaining an indulgence, are 
receiving the communion on fixed days ; visiting 
churches, in which certain prayers are to be said ; 
repeating some peculiar forms of prayer, either to God, 
or to the Virgin Mary, to which some pope has attached 
special indulgences, such as the famous prayer of 
Bernard to the Virgin, by which 100 days' ind2ilgence 
is gained every time it is repeated and a plenary one, 
at the end of every month, in which it has been recited 
every day ; and lastly saying so many Pater and Ave 
Maria before some image, crucifix, or medal, which 
has been consecrated for the purpose of imparting 
indulgences. 

But you may ask from what source does the Church 
draw so many graces and favours ? La doctrine 



108 



SUPER-ABUNDANT MERITS. 



chretienne^ published by the authorit}^ of the bishops of 
France, will answer you : C'est avec les merites sur- 
abondants de Jesus Christ, de la Sainte Vierge et des 
Saints que 1' Eglise acquitte ses enfants de ce qu'ils 
doivent a la justice divine, Voila la source, ou elle puise 
les graces qu'elle leur accorde. La dispensation de 
ce tresor immense lui appartient, et elle le distribue avec 
la mesure que lui dicte sa sagesse.''^ 

Thus the merits of the saints bei?ig made available 
both to the living and the dead ; and the belief having 
gradually prevailed that hardly any one went straight to 
heaven, without passing through purgatory, the indul- 
gences were sought after with great eagerness. This is 
not to be wondered at, for they addressed themselves to 
our nearest interests and to the most tender feeling of 
our nature, the love of our friends : so when people had 
once been fully persuaded that they could shorten the 
period of their own punishment, and that they could 
still be useful to their friends and dearest relations 
beyond the grave, no sacrifice appeared too great, in 
order to be able to perform so holy a duty. It is, above 
all, over the female sex, that this tender belief exercises 
most influence. No one can enter a large church on 

* It is with the super-abundant merits of Jesus Christ, of the 
Holy Yirgin and the Saints, that the Church acquits her children 
from what they owe to divine justice. This is the source, whence 
she draws the graces vrhich she grants to them. The dispensation 
of this immense treasure belongs to her, and she distributes it with 
the measure, which her justice dictates to her. 



SUPERSTITION PERPETUATED. 



109 



the continent, on the evening of All Saints^ when the 
vespers for the dead are chaunted, without being struck 
with a sentiment of awe and respect. He will see 
hundreds of women having all their heads covered with 
a black hood or veil, aj)parently absorbed in musing on 
their departed friends or reading by the light of tapers 
the solemn psalm. The church himg with black, the 
skulls and crossed bones, displayed before his eyes, 
the mournful chaunt, the numerous wax lights, every 
thing fills him with sentiments of deep solemnity. He 
may indeed deplore such mistaken notions of religious 
truth, and call to his mind these word of St. Paul : ''Ye 
are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God: 
knowing that of the Lord ye shall receive the reward of 
inheritance : for ye serve the Lord Christ. But he 
that doeth wrong shall receive for the wrong, w^iich he 
has done ; and there is no distinction of persons." He 
may remember the oscilla, tapers and purifications of 
the feasts of Saturn, yet he easily accounts how such 
a superstition was never given up by the descendants 
and successors of the ancient Romans. 



CHAPTEE X. 



And if by grace, then it is no more of works : otherwise grace 
is no more grace. But if it be of works, then is it no more grace : 
otherwise work is no more work." 

Si autem gratia, jam non ex operibus: alioquin gratia jam noii 
est gratia.* — Rom, xi,, 6. 



The reformed Churclies^ who take the Holy Scriptures^ 
as their only rule of faith^ believe that faith alone can 
save us ; but they do not reject good works. They 
believe from the teaching of the apostles, that good 
works, that is, a complete submission to the will of God, 
as evidenced by a holy and pious life, doing all that 
which is good and avoiding all that which is evil, are 
the fruits of faith, which cannot exist without them ; but 
they do not claim any merit in them. They believe 
that faith is of God, and therefore we have no merit in 

* The second part of the verse is not in the Vulgate, 



DOCTRINE OF FREE GRACE* 



111 



ourselves. For all have sinned and come short of 
the glory of God : being justified freely by his grace, 
through the redemption, Avhich is in Christ Jesus."— 
(Rom. iii.) They say with St. Paul: "knovdng, 
that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but 
by faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus 
Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, 
and not by the works of the law, for by the works of the 
law shall no flesh be justified" — (Gal. li.) 

The Roman Church indeed acknowledo^es that faith 
is necessary to salv^ation, but it also teaches that mian 
is justified by his works and not by faith alone. It 
brings in support of this teaching, the second chapter of 
the epistle of St. James, who says — What does it 
profit, my brethren, though a man say he has faith, and 
have not works ? can faith save him ? If a brother or 
a sister be naked or destitute of daily food, and one of 
you say unto them^ depart in peace, be ye warmed and 
filled : notwithstanding ye give them not those things, 
which are needful to the body : what doth it profit ? 
Even so faith, ij it has not works, is dead, being alone. 
Yea, a man may say, thou hast faith, and I have works : 
show me thy faith ivithout thy works, and I will show 
thee my faith by my ivorks. Thou believest that there 
is one God, thou doest well : the devils also believe and 
tremble. But wilt thou know, vain man, that faith 
without uorks is dead. Was not Abraham our father 



112 WORKS THE EVIDENCE OF FAITH. 

justified by works, when he had oiFered Isaac his son 
upon the altar ? Seest thou how faith wrought with his 
works, and by works was faith made perfect ? and the 
Scripture was fulfilled, which saith, Abraham believed 
God, and it was imputed unto him for righteousness ; 
and he was called the friend of God. Ye see then how 
that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only. 
For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith 
without works is dead also." 

It is clear that St. James wrote these words to confute 
the presumption of certain men, who pretended (as 
many have done since) that faith or belief in God was 
sufficient to save them, and was all which was required. 
For he says : Thou believest that there is one God ; 
thou doest well, the devils also believe and tremble." 
Therefore, what he so strenuously reproves here, is a 
mere negative, a bare assent to the truth of a proposition, 
a simple acknowledgment that there is one God, or that 
Jesus Christ came from God, to save men. He very 
aptly quotes the example of Abraham, to show that 
works are an evidence of faith, that without them there 
can be no true faith, in fact that faith in Christ cannot 
really exist ; for faitk is not only belief, it is confidence^ 
obedience, love. But, when St. James says, that Abraham 
was justified by works, he does not assert, that his works 
were accounted to him for righteousness, but that faith 
wrought with his works, and by woris was faith made 



abhaham's obedience. 



113 



perfect, namely, by the offering of his son, he proved 
iiis obedience to the commands, and his confidence in 
the promises of God, so the apostle adds : and the 
Scriptm-e was fulfilled which saith, Abraham believed 
God, and it was imputed to him for righteousness." 
Now the faith which was imputed to him for righteous* 
ness had been manifested, when ho was without a son 
or the hope of having one, for he believed in the promise 
of God; and he continued to shew this faith by h's 
obedience to God s command and his readiness to 
sacrifice even his son Isaac, however contraiy it might 
appear to the promise which had been made him of a 
numerous posterity. His obedience then w^as the 
evidence of his faith, and could not be separated from 
it, else he could have had no faith, he could not have 
trusted in God. 

The Refonned and Roman Churches equally acknow- 
ledge that without faith it is impossible to please God 
and that We are made partakers of Jesus Christ, if 
we hold the beginning of our confidence to the end.'' 
They believe that " we are kept by the power of God 
through faith unto salvation." They equally acquiesce 
in these words of St. Peter : And beside this^ giving 
all diligence, add to your faith virtue ; and to virtue 
knowledge ; and to knowledge temperance ; and to 
temperance patience ; and to patience godliness ; and 
4x) godliness brotherly kindness ; and to brotherly kind- 

H 



114 



WORKS THE EVIDENCE OE EAITH. 



iiess charity. For if these things be in you and abound^, 
they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor 
unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ." 

Protestants believe upon the testimony of Scripture, 
that faith in Jesus Christ consists in believing that God 
was pleased to send his only Son into the world to atone 
for the sins of men^ that by the sacrifice of himself all 
men who believe in him^ hope in him, and obey his 
precepts, might be saved, and justified in God. They 
believe that works, namely, doing every thing that God 
commands, are the necessary fruits and signs of our 
faith, are the inseparable marks of our obedience and 
love of God, but that we have no merit in them, because 
they all come from the gTace of God and not from 
ourselves. Their rule of faith being the ivord of God, 
and not men's opinion and individual inter j)retation, they 
adopt and cherish this doctrine, as they find it explicitly 
taught there. St. Paul says to the Ephesians — " But 
God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love, wherewith 
he loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath 
quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are 
saved.) And has raised us up together and made us 
sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus : That 
in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches 
of his grace in his kindness towards us in Christ Jesus. 
For by grace are ye saved through faith ; and that not 
of ourselves : it is the gift of God : Not of ivorks, lest 



MERIT OF GOOD WORKS. 



115 



any man should boast." And our Saviour tells his 
discii^les in the 17th chapter of St. Luke — "So likewise 
ye; when you shall have done all those things, which are 
commanded you, say : we are unprofitable servants : we 
have done that which was our duty to do." 

The Roman Church allows indeed that every good 
gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of 
lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of 
turning," and that without divine grace we can do 
nothing for our salvation, according to these v»'ords of 
our Lord : Without me you can do nothing." But 
it teaches at the same time that a man that is justified 
has merits before God, for his good works, and that by 
them he is entitled to an increase of grace, to the 
attainment of eternal life, and even to an increase of 
glory, as it is stated in the thirty-second canon of the 
sixth Session of the Council of Trent. Si quis dixerit 
hominis justificati bona opera ita esse dona Dei ut non 
sint etiam bona ipsius justificati merita ; aut i]3sum 
justificatum bonis operibus, qudd ab eo per Dei gratiam, 
et Jesu Christi meritum, cujus vivum membrum est, 
fiunt,non vere mereri augnientum gratias, vitamxternam, 
et ipsius vitse eeternee, si tamen in gratia decesserit, 
consecutionem, atque etiam glorice augmentum, Ana- 
thema Sit."* Here are a fevv men assembled together, 

* If any one should say that the good works of a justified man 
are such gifts of God, as not to be also the good merits of him, 
that is justified ; or that he who is justified does not truly deserve 

H 2 



116 ERRORS ARISING -FROM THIS DOCTRINE. 

who, after much wrangling and dispute, pronounce a 
solemn curse upon all those, who preferring rather to 
obey God than men, reject the false interpretation 
which those self erected expounders of God's decrees 
choose to give both by their teaching and practice to the 
most comforting doctrine given to man, by which he is 
taught to place his whole dependence upon God, and 
the merits of a merciful Saviour ! 

It is from this erroneous view, from an interpretation 
so contrary to the express declaration of Christ and his 
apostles, so destructive of genuine Christianity that 
numberless errors have arisen, if, indeed, the errors 
after having once crept in, did not give rise to this 
forced interpretation. 

In the first ages of the Church, some men, among 
the people of the East, who had embraced Christianity, 
led by the ascetic inclinations which have at every 
period distinguished those nations, retired in solitary 
places, in order to give themselves up to those exercises 
which, from time immemorial, had been considered by 
those people as necessary to subdue the flesh or corrupt 
matter, and to purify the spirit. These exercises were 
at first adopted as a means of discipline : but how 

by the good works, which are done by him through the grace of God 
and the merits of Christ, whose living member he is, an increase of 
grace, Mfe eternal, and the attainment of life eternal itself, though 
even he should fall off in grace, and also an increase of glory, let 
him be accursed. 



USELESSNESS OF ASCETISM. 



117 



insufficient they were is clearly proved by the confession 
of those^ who imposed upon themselves the severest 
austerities. Whipping, fasting, hair-cloth, and dirt 
could no more cool a warm temparament, than the act 
of tearing off his shoulders the cloak of Dejanira could 
extinguish the fire, which consumed the limbs of 
Hercules. All was internal : all was in the imagination. 
A life of active usefulness, temperance and moderation, 
the mortification of the senses^, a complete dependence 
upon grace and mercy, a deep sense of God's immedi- 
ate presence, a spiritual union with Christ, constant 
watching and prayer, that in ward and heartfelt prayer 
for the help and support of the Holy Spirit, are the 
means recommended in the G ospel ; and they are 
acknowledged by all judicious men as the best and 
only preservatives against an unruly imagination and 
worldly appetites. 

We have only to read the legends ^hose saints, 

to feel how useless all their austerities ap}>eared even to 
themselves, to obtain the end which they sought. I 
shall not dwell upon the fables, which fill the lives of 
saints; I will merely mention one, who was a great 
man, notvvithstanding his extravagancies and fits of 
passion, and quote his own v/ords, which I have taken 
from a French biography, written by men, who were 
zealous Roman Catholics, and great admirers of all 
those saints, whom their Church has canonized and 



118 Jerome's testimony. 

worships. St. Jerome, who certainly was the most 
erudite man of his age, who carried austerities to the 
utmost extremity that human nature can suffer, speaks 
thus of himself : Combien de fois etant dans la plus 
profonde solitude, m'imaginais-je neanmoins etre au 
spectacle des Remains ! Mes membres sees et decharnes 
etaient couvers d'un sac ; mes jours se passaient 
en gemissements, et si le sommeil m'accahlait quelque- 
fois, malgre la terre dure sur la quelle je me couchais, 
c'etait moins un repos pour moi qu'une espece 
de tourment. Cependant je ne pouvais arreter mon 
imagination volage. Mon visage etait dejigure par le 
jeune, et monccEur brulait malgre moi demauvais desirs. 
Toute ma consolation etait de me jeter aux pieds de 
Jesus Christ sur la croix et de les arroser de mes 
larmes.'""^ 

But as his almost incredible austerities could not 
soothe his mind and allay those unruly desires, which 
haunted his imagination, neither were they potent 
enough to soften his temper and instil into him that 
spirit of charity and meekness, which is the bond of 

How many timesjbeing in the deepest solitude, did I imagine 
myself to be at the Show of the Romans ! My dry and emaciated 
limbs were covered with sackcloth; my days were spent in groans, 
and if sleep sometimes overcame me, in spite of the hard earth, 
upon which 1 lay, it was less a rest for me, than a kind of torment. 
However I could not stop my fickle imagination. My face was 
disfigured by fasting, and my heart burned in spite of myself with 
Imd desires. All my consolation was to cast myself at the feet of 
Jesus Christ on the cross, and to water them with my tears. 



EFFECT OF PERIODICAL FASTING. 



119 



union and peace in society, and vfhich is so specially 
recommended by our Saviour and his apostles. 

The Church of Rome orders fasting at certain periods 
under pain of sin, and the priests tell us that it is 
enjoined as a sign of obedience and a sure means of 
of mortifying the flesh and humbling the proud spirit ; 
whereas it has very often a contrary effect, in spite of 
the good will and sincerity of those who practise it. The 
emaciated face and em23ty stomach will not subdue pride 
nor put down anger. A hungry man is an angry 
man" is a proverb founded upon observation and 
experience and fully borne out by the rules of physiology. 
Habitual fasting, as a mere duty, will tend to sour the 
temper and will secretly nourish pride rather than 
subdue it. I appeal to those, who are in the habit of 
fasting, even to priests themselves, v/hether they have 
not found in a number of instances, that they are more 
apt to lose their temper, to feel peevish at the least 
contradiction, ( for it is contradiction which tries a man's 
temper) when fasting, than they are at any other time ? 
We have in Jerome a striking instance, how unfit fasting 
and mortifications were to subdue that spirit ! Never 
did a man carry virulence and abuse to a greater excess. 
When he was at Rome, a foul calumny was laid to his 
charge ; his innocence was acknowledged ; but the 
people, say his biographers, prejudiced by the priests, 
whom Jerome censured ivltk zeal and perhaps ivith 



120 



Jerome's violent tempek> 



too little reserve, always believed him guilty. He 
retired to the Bethlehem and wrote against the opinions 
of several men^ chiefly against his old friend RufinuSo 
" Cette querelle^ say his apologists^, portee aux 
dernieres extremites causa bien du scandale, St. 
Jerome^ malgTe ses grandes vertus, avait les defauts de 
rhumanitL Quiconque se declarait contre lui on contra 
ses ouvrages etait presque toujours ie dernier des 
hommes. II mit dans ses disputes et surtout dans celle- 
ci, beaucoup d'aigreur; il traita Rufin avec hauteur,, 
pour ne pas dire avec emportement. Quand on lit les 
injures dont ill'accabla, on est surpris que des invectives 
si fortes soient sorties d'une houche si pure. Ce saint 
n'en etait pas moins illustre pour avoir ete homme."* 

God forbid that I should seem to insinuate any thing 
derogatory to the merits of an eminent man, for whose 
profound erudition, indefatigable labour and general 
sanctity of life, I have ever entertained the highest 
respect. Though his zeal was not always according to 
knowledge, his defects were those of his age, and his 
enthusiastic mind led him to foster and practise to excess 

* " This quarrel carried to the last extremities caused a great 
deal of scandal. St. Jerome, notwithstanding his great virtues, had 
the defects of humanity. Whoever declared himself against him or 
against his ivorks, was almost always the meanest of men. He in- 
dulged great sourness in his disputes and especially in this one. He 
treated Rufinus with haughtiness, not to say with rage. When we 
read the abuses with which he loaded him, we are sm-prised that 
so violent invectives should have come out of so pure a mouths 
This saint was not the less illustrious for having been a man. 



WANT OF GENUINE CHRISTIANITY. 



121 



that false piety and those superstitious observances, 
which had been growing in fashion for more than a 
century, and which far from soothing, only increased 
his natural irritability. I only mention him, out of a 
thousand equally eminent men in the Church, to shew 
the evil effects of that mistaken spirit, which induced 
men to fly to other means, than those prescribed by 
Jesus Christ, who had said : Peace I leave with you, 
my 23eace I give unto you : not as the world giveth, 
give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither 
let it be afraid." If ye shall ask anything in my name, 
I will do it." If ye love me, keep my commandments." 

It is very evident that all the fastings and austerities 
of St. Jerome did not enable him to fulfil this command- 
ment : But I say unto you, love your enemies, bless 
them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, 
and pray for them that despitefully use you, and 
persecute you." The history of councils prove also 
that those men, who recommended and ordered fasting, 
abstinence and all kinds of bodily humiliations, knew 
not real humility, which consists in forbearance. No 
assembly of men ever exhibited more animosity, a more 
fierce and uncompromising spirit, than most of the 
Councils of the Church, wdthout even excepting the 
last of all, the famous Council of Trent. 

Those saintly characters, who from the third century 
to our days, have drawn upon themselves the veneration 



122 



MISTAKEN ADMIRATION. 



of men^ were distinguished by the rigorous austerities 
of their life, connected, no doubt, in most instances 
with purity of morals, a real intention to serv^e God and 
sincere desire to save their souls. But note ; it was not 
their good life, their real Christian humility which 
attracted the admiration of the multitude. It was their 
austerities which gave them a name, which made 
crowds assemble round their cells, listen with eagerness 
to their words, repair in pilgrimage to their tombs and 
hope in miraculous cures being performed by their 
bones. It was the belief in these miraculous cures, 
and the fancied visions of their spirits, with which some 
heated imaginations were haunted, which caused these 
men to be looked upon as supernatural beings in the 
third and fourth centuries, to be invoked as intercessors 
with God in the two following centuries, and to be 
canonized by the popes as lawful mediators with Christ, 
in later ages. 

Neither do I believe that all those pretended cures 
were fictitious, as our modern sceptics have represented 
them ; though many, that are recorded, are undoubtedly 
most extravagant forgeries. I have told you before that 
the nervous system under the impression of a vivid 
imagination, appears so susceptible of influencing the 
v/hole body, that sometimes very remarkable changes 
have taken place, and continue to take place. Of course 
the pilgrhn, the devotee, who has perhaps crawled on 



FALSE MIRACLES. 



123 



his knees to the holy tomb, in the highest expectation, 
does not fail to ascribe such a wonderful change to the 
interposition of the Saint or to the virtue of the relic. 
But the Roman Church is not the only one, which 
lays claim to the performance of miracles ; though it 
asserts that the cures performed in the other Churches 
are spurious. The Asiatic and Greek Churches have 
the same pretensions and have the same crowds of 
authentic witnesses to prove the facts. Besides, the 
followers of the Grand Lama, who pretends to be infalli- 
ble, and who is surrounded by a numerous clergy nearly 
resembling the jDapal hierarchy, even in dress, with 
numerous convents of nuns and friars, having also the 
beads, the rosary hanging from their side, in whose 
temple is also to be seen the image of the Virgin, lay 
equal claims to numerous miracles. The same thing 
happens in the temples of Brahma, or of Siva, and 
even at the shrine of a Mahommedan Santon. 

All these abuses, which every sincere and enlightened 
man must deplore, and which have deprived the Christ- 
ian worship of its pure and spiritual forms and have 
assimilated it to ancient and modern superstitions, 
have sprung from this dangerous and un scriptural inter- 
pretation of the merit of men in their good works. Men, 
who had laid up such a store of good works by their 
eminent sanctity, were thought to have become the 
favourite dispensers of God's graces : hence they were 



124 



WORSHIP OF MEN. 



inv^oked, they were worshipped. The llessed Vh'gin 
was deified, if not in words, at least in practice. The 
image of the Zodiacal Virgin, with the infant Sun in 
her arms, which was to be found in the temples of the 
East, was first imported into Arabia as a very apt re- 
presentation of the Virgin Mary, whom a sect, called 
Coilyridians, is said to have worshipped as a goddess. 
From thence this image was adopted, after images had 
become fashionable, by the Greek and Latin Churches 
who probably knew nothing of its origin. 

So you see how ill-founded are the assertions of those, 
who pretend to draw an argument from this image 
against the truth of Christianity, since it was borrowed 
from heathen worship, as all images had been, long 
aftei' the spiritual forms of genuine Christianity, which 
rejected all images, had been mixed and corrupted by 
the mistaken belief in the meritorious influence of men, 
and by the practice of invoking saints and angels. It 
was not till after the Nestorian controversy about the 
propriety of applying the epithet of Mother^ of God, to 
the mother of Jesus Christ, that any extraordinary zeal 
was felt and manifested for the worship of the Virgin 
Mary. This epithet had first been used by the Orthodox 
party, in the Arian controversy, to testify their belief in 
the divinity of Christ. In consequence of the denial of 
Christ's divinity by the Arians, great honours began to 
be paid to the Virgin Mary by their opponents, who 



WORSHIP OF THE VIRGIN. 



125 



did not think that they could exalt her too high as the 
Mother of God mcarnate» So that it may he safely 
asserted that her worship arose out of the Arian contro- 
versy. Nestorius, bishop of Constantinople^ maintained 
that she ought not to be called the Mother of God, but 
the Mother of Christ. He was violently opposed by 
Cyril, bishop of Alexandria ; the dispute grew warm ; 
the two prelates loaded each other with anathemas ; and 
from that quarrel, which greatly interested the feelings 
of the clergy and people, the worship of the Virgin took 
a great expansion. 

As men seldom invent, when they can copy, this 
image, which had been in use for some time in the 
heretic Churches of Arabia, and which had been intro- 
duced by the Gnostics,^ who had been the first to defile 
Christianity with images and allegories, was adopted 
and imitated as a faithful representation of the Mother 
of GodJ' holding her divine Son in her arms. The 
lapse of ages has gone on increasing the veneration 
which then began to be shewed to the blessed Virgin, 

* As the Gnostics were divided into several sects, some of 
them kept up with a mixture of Christianity the old worship of the 
Great Goddess of Phoenicia, who was called " the Queen of 
heaven," and to whom cakes used to be offered, as we see in the 
seventh chapter of Jeremiah, v. 18. " The women knead dough to 
make cakes to the Queen of heaven." The women of Ai-abia 
substituted to the Queen of heaven the Virgin Maiy, and in course 
of time the statues and images by which they represented her 
passed into the West; and Cluistians instead of praying for her, as 
they first did, prayed to her and worshipped her. 



126 



MARY SUBSTITUTED FOR, CYBELS 



The most glorious titles were bestowed upon her^ many 
of which were taken from the Pagan ritual : for besides 
the eminent attributes^, which are ascribed to her and 
which have in them a Christian idea, several appellations 
hy which she is invoked are those which were bestowed 
upon the Mother of the Gods, Magna Dea, Mater 
alma, Mater Deorun. She became the gate of heaven, 
Janua cosli;, the tower of ivory, turris eburnea, the 
morning star, Stella matutina, the m}'Stical rose, Rosa 
mystica, &c. Her image was carried in solemn pro- 
cession on the day of purification, as that of Cybele 
used to be carried about the streets of Pagan Rome : 
hymns were sung in her honour, which were comj)lete 
imitations of the hymns addressed to Cybele, as her 
image, the token of plenty, was carried about. The 
Antiphony or anthem, which is sung after Vespers from 
the day of purification to Easter in all Churches on the 
continent, is still one of those imitations. Here it is, 
copied word for word: Ave Regina cselorum, Ave 
Domina Angelorum, Salve, radix. Salve, porta, ex 
qua mundo lux est orta. Gaude, Virgo gloriosa, Super- 
omnes speciosa, Vale, 6 valde decora, et pro nobis 
Christum exora. ''Hail Queen of heavens. Hail, 
mistress of Angels, hail oh root ; hail, oh gate, from 
which light has arisen unto the world : Rejoice, oh 
glorious Virgin, beautiful above all: We salute thee, 
oh most handsome, and pray Christ for us." 



SUPREME TTORSHIP PAID TO MARY. 



127 



The evening service is concluded with this prayer : 
Sub tuum proesidium confugimus, Sancta Dei genitrix; 
nostras deprecationes ne despicias in necessitatibus 
nostris, sed d periculis cvmcHs libera no§ semper, 
Virgo gloriosa et benedicta." We fiy to thy patronage, 
holy Mother of God, do not despise our prayers in our 
necessities ; but always deliver us from all dangers, 
O glorious and blessed Virgin. 

I have insisted upon this point, because you have 
been told that the invocation of saints is not a necessary 
part of the service of the Roman Church, and that it is 
not true that prayers are regularly addressed to the 
Virgin and to the saints. Whereas Vespers or the 
evening service, always end with this prayer, in which 
the quality of the Virgin, as a mere intercessor, is not 
even acknowledged ; but her power of helping men is 
plainly declared ; for she is told to deliver us from all 
dangers : and the word prcesidium, which in the 
English version is rendered by patronage, means more 
than mere intercession ; it means protection, refuge, 
safeguard : in fact in praying to God himself, they do 
not use a stronger term. 



CHAPTEE XI. 



" it is the spirit that quickeneth ; the flesh profiteth nothing : 
the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are lifeV* 
St. John, vi. 63. 



It is not, however, only by the addition of man-worsliip> 
that the Church of Rome has departed from the original 
purity of Christian doctrine. The tendency to mate- 
rialize has carried it further, and by interpreting in a 
material and natural sense the words, which our Lord 
pronounced, when, on the eve of his passion, he instituted 
the Sacrament, which he intended to be a commemoration 
and a testimonial of the sacrifice, which he was about 
to make of himself, it has set up for adoration the figure 
for the thing signified. It has even gone further, it 
has pretended to renew that sacrifice, which was made 
once for all," and of which all were to be partakers, 
who, with a lively faith and sincere repentance, received 



i'KJURATIVE LANGUAGE. 129 



the sacrament of the body and blood of Christ, offered 
to God as an atonement for their sins and for those of 
the whole world. 

In reading the words delivered by any one with the 
intention of conveying moral or religious instruction, 
we must consider the genius of the language in which 
they are spoken, as well as the circumstances, in which 
they were pronounced, or else we are liable to fall into 
egregious mistakes, and their meaning will entirely 
escape us. It was particularly the custom of Eastern 
nations, to borrow from natural objects expressions to 
convey a moral or spiritual meaning ; and it continues 
to be the same at the present day. Therefore the 
language of Scripture is full of metaphors and similitudes. 
Jesus Christ spoke constantly in parables, when he 
addressed the Jews ; and he often taught the most 
spiritual doctrine by using expressions relating to the 
most common objects. I will quote to you a few 
instances to shew you what I mean. *^ Then said Jesus 
unto them again, verily, verily, I say unto you, I am 
the door of the ^Ae^p... Blessed are they, which do 
hunger and thirst after righteousness... Beware of the 
leaven of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees.,.And I 
appoint unto you a kingdom, as my Father hath ap- 
pointed unto me : that you may eat and drink at my 
table m my kingdom... Verily, verily, I say unto thee; 
except a man he horn again, he cannot see the kingdom 

I 



130 



MEAT TO EVERLASTING LIEE. 



of God... Even in the Lord's prayer^ that great bond of 
union between Christians, which they all know in their 
native language and daily repeat^ these Vv^ords : Give 
lis this day our daily bread ; and forgive us our debts^ 
as we forgive our debtors/' have a spiritual meaning. 

In the sixth chapter of St. John^ 27 v., Jesus says 
to the Jews. " Labour not for the meat which perisheth 
but for that meat which endure th to everlasting life^ 
which the Son of man shall give unto you : for him has 
God the Father sealed." The people said unto him.^ 
^^What sign shewest thou then, that we may see and 
believe thee P ¥/hat dost thou work ? Our fathers did 
eat manna in the desert ; as it is vv^ritten, He gave them 
bread from heaven to eat" Then Jesus said unto them: 
Verily, verily, I say unto you, Moses gave you not 
that bread from heaven ; but my Father giveth you the 
true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is he 
which came down from heaven, and giveth life unto the 
world. Then said they unto him. Lord, evermore give 
us this bread. And Jesus said unto them, / am the 
bread of life ; he that cometh to me shall never himger;, 
and he that beli^veth on me shall never thirst,'' 

In this chapter our Saviour first tells the Jews not to 
labour for the meat that perisheth, but for that meat 
y/hich endureth unto everlasting life. It is very evident 
that, though he uses the v/ord meat, he means sound 
doctrine, and every thing which can give us faith and 



THE BREAD OF LIFE. 



131 



confidence in God, be pleasing to him and secure our 
eternal salvation. The Jews seem to have understood 
it in this sense ; for they immediately asked him ; 

What shall we do^ that we might work the works of 
God ?" Jesus answered and said unto them : " This is the 
work of God, that ye believe on him whom he has sent." 
Therefore he is the meat for which we must labour, and 
faith in him gives us that meat. The Jews asked him 
for a sign, and said that God gave their fathers bread 
from heaven to eat. Jesus answered; Moses gave 
you not that bread from heaven ; but my Father giveth 
you the true bread from heaven ; For the bread of God 
is he which cometh down from heaven, and giveth life 
unto the world." It is clear, that he uses here the word 
bread in a purely spiritual sense, as he had before used 
the word meat, for certainly he did not come down from 
heaven to give animal life unto the world. Yet the 
Jews seem to have understood it in a material sense ; 
for they said to him : Lord, evermore give us this 
bread." — The answer of Jesus seems to shew, that, 
although he knew very well that they had mistaken his 
words, yet he did not choose to explain and went on 
still using the figurative language. Now he spoke 
clearly of himself and declared that he is he whom God 
has sent : " I am the bread of life, he that cometh to 
me shall never hufiger, and he that believeth on me, 
shall never thirst J' These - words are too clear to 

I 2 



132 



THE BREAD FROM HEAVEN. 



require any comment, and it would be completely 
absurd to pretend that they have the remotest connec- 
tion with bread or food to be received by the body in 
any way whatever ; for it would be a mere equivocation 
to maintain the first proposition, that he is to be taken 
as substantial food, and to reject the natural meaning of 
the second proposition, namely, he that cometh to me 
shall never hunger." 

After having thus spoken in figures he explained 
positively and clearly that which he had been saying. 
He first reproached them for their unbelief, then he 
added: ''All that the Father giveth me shall come to 
me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast 
out. For / came down from heaven, not to do my will, 
but the will of him that sent me. And this is the 
Father's will, which hath sent me, that of all, which he 
hath given me, I should loose nothing, but should raise 
it up again at the last day." The Jews murmured at him, 
because he said. " I am the bread which came down 
from heaven." Here they understood him plainly and 
were offended that he whose father and mother they 
knew, should say that they ought to believe that he came 
down from heaven to be their spiritual food and 
give them eternal life. Jesus therefore answered 
and said unto them ; murmur not among yourselves. 
No man can come to me, except the Father, which has 
sent me draw him : and / ivUl raise him up at the last 



THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST. 



133 



day. It is written in the prophets. And they shall be 
all taught of Gocl. Every man therefore that hath heard, 
and hath learned of the Father, cometh unto me." 

Here again he declared in emphatic unequivocal 
terms that faith is the gift of God, and that it is through 
faith in him, Jesus Christ, whom the Father has sent to 
give life unto the world, that men can obtain everlasting 
life. To shew us that he is the link, which connects us 
with the invisible God, that in him humanity and 
divinity meet and form an indissoluble alliance, he goes 
on to say — Not that any man has seen the Father, 
save he which is of God, he hath seen the Father : 
Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that believeth on me 
hath everlasting life." 

After having said all that which was more than suffi- 
cient in order to prevent his hearers, and afterwards all 
those who would read his words with their eyes opened, 
and with a mind unbiassed by any preconceived notions 
concerning the literal sense of his expressions, he 
resumed his figurative language and said — I am that 
bread of life. Your fathers did eat manna in the 
wilderness, and are dead. This is the bread which 
cometh down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof 
and not die. I am the living bread which came down 
from heaven ; if any man eat of this bread, he shall live 
for ever : and the bread, that I wiil give is 7ny flesh, 
which I will give for the life of the world." Now from 



134 Christ's body saceificed for sin. 



the beginning of this important discourse, which contains 
all the mystery of human salvation, he had been careful 
to explain in explicit terms that the meat for which we 
must labour and which endureth unto everlasting life is 
to be obtained by faith in him, whom God has sent. 
And when the .Jews asked him to give them that true 
bread from heaven, which giveth life unto the world, he 
told them — " I am the bread of life. I came down 
from heaven not to do my own will, but the will of him 
that sent me. And this is the will of him that sent me, 
that every one who seeth the Son, and believeth on him, 
may have everlasting life : and I will raise him up at 
the last day." Then he explained by w^hat means he 
was to impart everlasting life : And the bread that I 
will give is my flesh, which I Vvili give for the life of 
the world." Kere he clearly declared that he was to 
sacrifice his life, namely to give his flesh for the sins of 
the world. 

Notwithstanding his preceding explanation about 
the meat which endureth unto everlasting life, and 
though the Jews, who first mistook the true bread from 
heaven for real bread, to be taken as food, seem at last 
to have perfectly understood that he spoke figuratively, 
since they said, Is not this the son of Joseph ? how is 
it then that he saith, I came down from heaven f " yet 
they fell again into the same error and took these words 
in the literal sense. Then as thev murmured and said 



CHKIST MUST BE OUR FOOD. 



135 



among themselves. How can this m^ii give us his flesh 
to eat ? he continued to insist in stronge)^ terms on the 
- sacrifice of his body, which every one who seeth the Son, 
and helieveth on him, must trust in, and receive as the 
food of his soul, in ordei'to have everlasting life : '^'Verily, 
verily I say unto you ; except ye eat the flesh of the 
Son of man and drink his blood, ye have no life in you. 
Who so eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood, hath 
eternal life : and I mil raise him u|) at the last day. 
For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink 
indeed. He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my 
blood, dwelleth in me and I in him. As the living 
Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father ; So 
he that eateth me, even he shall live by me." 

How plainly do all these words relate to the real 
sacrifice of his personal body and blood, with which he 
was about to crown his divine mission, through which 
those who had faith, namely all those whom the Father 
hath given him should live by him. And to show that 
his words had an exclusively spiritual meaning and made 
no allusion to the eating of material bread or flesh, nor 

j to the drinking of real blood, he repeats that which he 
had already said about the manna, which, though a 
heavenly gift, was a substantial food, and contrasted it 
again with that bread of God, which giveth life. " This 
is that bread, which came down from heaven ; not as 

i your fathers did eat manna and are dead : he that eateth 
this bread shall live for even" Now his flesh did not 



136 SPIRITUAL PURPORT OF HIS WORDS, 



coine down from heaven ; therefore it could not be that 
bread, which they must eat, in order to live for ever ; 
this consideration was an ample evidence that he could 
not mean, that any one was to eat his flesh. But he 
came down from heaven, to put on a human body, that 
by the sacrifice of his flesh and the shedding of his 
blood he might atone for sin and give life unto the 
world. It is faith in that saving truth, which gives that 
meat, which endureth unto everlasting life, so, if we 
wish never to hunger and never to thirst, we must make 
it the constant, and daily food of our souls ; in short we 
must live by him, even as the living Father has sent 
him, and he lives by the Father, 

Notwithstanding all his previous explanations, many 
even of his disciples seem to have taken his words in the 
literal sense, and to have been perplexed about their 
meaning. "Many therefore of his disciples, when they 
had heard this, said, this is a hard saying, who can hear 
it ?" Then by addressing a question to his disciples he 
asserts that they were to be witnesses of a fact, which 
would be the accomplishment, and the most irresistible 
proof of the important truths, which he had been teach- 
ing. But at the same time to draw them out of the 
error, into which they had fallen by taking his words in 
a real and material sense concerning his flesh and blood, 
he added this explanatory observation : It is the spirit 
that quickeneth ; the flesh profiteth nothing ; the words 
that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are lifeJ^ 



Christ's answer to xicodemus. 



137 



It is important to remark that he had addressed the 
same explanation to Nicodemus, who had fallen into the 
error, when he asked Jesus; How can a man he horn, 
when he is old ?" Now the two passages are perfectly par- 
allel and have reference to the same object, regeneration 
through faith in the Son of God, who, he tells Nicodemus, 
so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, 
that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but 
have everlasting life. So when Nicodemus said unto 
him. How can a man be born when he is old ? Jesus 
shewed him the S23iritual 23urport of his doctrine by 
saying, That which is born of the flesh, is flesh ; and 
that which is born of the spirit is spirit." 

I have entered into this long explanation on this im- 
portant passage, which contains the whole doctrine of 
Christian redemption, to shew you how Jesus Christ, 
after the manner of the Eastern nations, used a figurative 
language, to convey a purely spiritual doctrine, which 
men were to receive, even while he vvas present among 
them as the food and nourishment of their souls. The 
members of the Church of Rome earnestly quote a part 
of this chapter, in order to proja the erroneous view 
concerning the eucharist which gradually crept into the 
Church, and which they now entertain. We shall 
examine afterwards how far they are borne oait in the 
application of this passage to the support of their 
opinion. 



CHAPTEE XII. 



" In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because 
that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might 
live through him." — 1 John, iv.9. 



Three evangelists only^ viz. : St. Matthew, St. Mark, 
and St. Luke, mention the institution of the sacrament 
of the Lord's supper. Before we pass to the examina- 
tion of the words of Jesus, such as they have heen 
transmitted to us in the gospels, let us consider for a 
mom.ent the nature of his misvsion. — He came to shew 
us the way to God — being God himself, he put on a 
human body, in order to do the work of human re- 
demption : He gave this body a sacrifice for us : He 
reconciled sinners with God : He rose again in his 
glorified body : He triumphed over death : He returned 
to God. 



THE lord's supper. 



139 



Before he left the earth in his mortal body he wished 
to leave to us a memorial of this truth ; he wished to 
give us a sign of this great mystery of our redemption, 
which should make it constantly present to us — he 
instituted this sacrament, sacra menti, so called, hecause 
it conveys to the mind sacred or spiritual blessings. Now 
as all spiritual blessings, all moral injunctions, all in- 
tellectual knowledge can only be communicated through 
material organs, by means of material objects, he took 
bread and wine, which, besides being the staff of life in 
that time and country, were the necessary appendages 
of the partaking of the Paschal Lamb. The bread being 
unleavened, was the figure of the affliction of the people 
of God in Egypt ; and the fruit of the vine, which they 
called the blood of the grape, was the figure of the 
blood with which the houses were purified and the 
people saved thereby. - 

It is therefore important to observe the moment, 
which he chose for the institution of this sacrament. 
It was at the close of the feast in which he had been 
celebrating the passover with his apostles. Both among 
the Jews and Gentiles, with whom sacrifices formed so 
essential a part of religious service, it was the custom 
to have a feast upon the thing which had been offered, 
this was called the feast upon the sacrifice, and all w^ho 
were partakers of this feast, were considered to partake 
* See Josephus, at the end of the 2nd Book. 



140 



FEAST UPON THE SACRIFICE. 



in the henejits of the sacrifice. So the Jews were 
enjoined to eat the paschal lamb at the feast of the 
Passover, not only to commemorate their deliverance 
from Egypt, hut in order that all might partake of the 
sacrifice which had been offered for the whole people, 
as we see in St. Paul's first epistle to the Corinthians, 
c. X., in w^hich he says : " Behold Israel after the flesh : 
are not they w4iich eat of the sacrifices partakers of the 
altar." He reminds the Corinthians of this fact, in order 
to shew to them that the sacrifice of the body of Christ is 
communicated to all, who in faith commemorate this 
sacrifice by breaking the bread and drinking the cup 
in the sacrament. For he had just told them : Where- 
fore, my dearly beloved, flee from idolatry. I speak as 
to tvise men; judge ye what I say. The cup of 
blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the 
blood of Christ P The bread, which we break, is it 
not the communion of the body of Christ ? For we 
being many are one bread, and one body, for we are all 
partakers of that one buead." He very plainly in- 
timates, that we are thereby all partakers of that one 
bread, just as all Israel after the flesh in eating the 
paschal lamb, were partakers of the sacrifice of the 
passover— (Dent. xvi. 2.) 

The passover was kept as a memorial of the day, . 
when the Lord smote the land of Egypt, but spared the 
congregation of Israel, which he delivered from bondage. 



THE MOMENT OF THE INSTITUTION. 14 i 

So Jesus Christ, just before his Passion, instituted this 
memorial of his body and blood which was to last 
throughout all generations ; and all who should in faith 
eat this bread and drink this cup, in remembrance of 
him, were to be partakers of the sacrifice of his body 
and blood ; were to receive life everlasting through his 
blood, which he was about to shed for the sins of the 
world. 

Let us see the words which have been written, as 
being spoken by Jesus at the very moment, when he 
instituted the sacrament. 

1. Matthew xxvi. 26. ''And as they were eating 
Jesus took bread, and blessed and brake it, and gave it 
to the disciples, and said, take, eat, this is my body. 
And he took the cup and gave thanks, and gave it to 
them, saying, drink ye all of it : for this is my blood of 
the New Testament, which is shed for many for the 
remission of sins. But I say unto you, I will not drink 
henceforth of this f ruit of the vine, until that day when 
I drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom." 

2. Mark xiv. 22. And as they did eat, Jesus took 
bread, and blessed, and brake it, and gave to them, and 
said, take, eat : this is my body. And he took the cup, 
and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them : and 
they all drank it. And he said unto them, this is my 
blood of the new testament, which is shed for many. 
Verily I say unto you, I will drink no more of the fruit 



142 THE WOKDS or THE INSTITUTION. 



of the vine, until that clay that I clrmk it new in the 
kingdom of God.'' 

3. Luke xxii. 19. ''And he took bread, and gave 
thanks and brake it, and gave unto them, saying, this is 
my body which is given for you : this do in remem- 
brance of me. Likewise also the cup after supper, 
saying, this cup is the new testament in my blood, 
which is shed for you." 

In reading the Holy Scriptures, or even the moral 
works of any ancient vaiter, we must never forget { I 
repeat) the genius of the language in which they were 
written and the circumstances in which certain expres- 
sions were uttered. If the words of a sentence form a 
proper, an admissible sense in their natural signification ; 
then we are bound in general to admit the literal inter- 
pretation. But if the literal interpretation is repugnant 
to reason and to the senses : if it has not in itself any 
important superiority, which should cause us to object 
to the figurative sense : if on the contrary it shock 
our ideas of propriety, offer no advantage and be opposed 
to the general purport of the life and language of the 
speaker, then we are bound to reject it and admit the 
figurative sense. I hope with God's assistance to be 
able to prove to you that this is particularly the case 
with this important passage ; that it conveys a spiritual 
and not a material injunction ; that the spiritual union 
which it enjoins is entirely consonant with our Saviour's 



SPIRITUAL INTERPRETATION^ 



143 



mission, that it elevates the soul, purifies the morals, and 
unites man with his God, with his Redeemer in heavenly 
contemplation. Whereas the literal interpretation tends 
to detract from that high spirituality, those elevating 
thoughts, which it was the intention of the Saviour to 
convey to his disciples. It draws the attention from 
saving faith to minute details, to ceremonies, and mere 
hodily preparations. The hody is then the mansion 
which is to he prepared to receive the Saviour : hence 
all those childish regtdations, which have been intro- 
duced about the state of the stomach, spitting, eating 
and drinking, and the mode of swallowing, &c. 

I allow, that many, who believe in the change of sub- 
stance, do attach high blessings to a due receiving of 
this sacrament, and consider that the mind and heart 
must be purified from all sinful inclination, in order 
that one may be joined with the body of Christ, 
But this union, this incorporation is supposed to be 
going through a kind of carnal process, by which our 
body becomes the body of Christ, and we put on his 
living flesh. *'Comme les aliments, says la Doctrine 
Chretienne, que nous prenous se melant a notre corps^ 
deviennent notre corps, de meme, en recevant la Sainte 
Eucharistie, notre corps devient Jesus Christ; car il ya 
cette difference, que les aliments ordinaires se changent 
en notre substance, au lieu que la communion nous 
transforme en Jesus Christ, c'est ce qui faisait dire a 



144 



MATERIAL INTERPRETATION. 



I'Apotre S. Paul: " Ce n'est plus moi qui vis, ce'st Jesus 
Christ qui vit en moi."* 

So you see tiiat even those who believe in the material 
change of the elements and are above the ignohile pecus, 
the blunt multitude, which mechanically receives the 
wafer and mechanically repeats its acts of faith in the 
real presence, are obliged to attach a spiritual meaning 
to the words of Christ, in order to realize their union 
with him. But this spiritualization is founded on the 
principle of absorption, which taught that our flesh must 
be subdued, must be renovated, in order that we may be 
incorporated with the deity and be absorbed again into 
that great whole, of which our spirits form a part. Yet 
this idea is still borrowed from Oriental philosophy, 
which had engrafted so many of its principles upon 
genuine Christianity. We are indebted to the ancient 
mystics for a belief in the material presence and all the 
reasonings, to which it has led : for it was gradually 
introduced as their theology, with their enthusiastic 
notion of union with God, obtained credit and authority 
in the Christian Church. 

I now call your attention to these most important 

* As the aliments which we take, by being mixed with our body, 
become our body, so by receivuig the holy Eucharist, our body 
becomes Jesus Christ; for there is this difference, that the:ordinaigr 
food is changed into our substance, whereas the communion trans- 
forms us into Christ, it is this which made the Apostle St. Paul 
say " It is no longer I who Uve, it is Christ who hves in me." 
Doct. Chretienne, Lect. 89 



CHRIST, THE PASCHAL LAMB. 



145 



words, which are calculated to give so much spiritual 
comfort to the true believer, to refine his soul from all 
earthly dross, and to raise up his mind to the con- 
templation of the heavenly mansions, where the glorified 
body of Christ, triumphing over death, wait^ to unite 
him with God in endless felicity. 

On celebrating the feast of the Passover, Jesus was 
about to crown his labours by the sacrifice of himself, 
this sacrifice which he had so often announced as being 
voluntary on his part and necessary for man. Being 
on the point of returning to the Father, he chose this 
important occasion to leave to his Church, to all who 
call upon his name, a memorial of his sufiferings, a 
testimony of his sacrifice, a pledge of their salvation. 

So as he was himself the Paschal Lamb which was 
to be offered to God, in instituting this blessed sacra- 
ment he made use of the very same words, which he 
had spoken to the Jews on a previous occasion, and 
which were nearly those, which every head of a family 
used in breaking the bread, and blessing the cup, which 
he delivered to all who were present at the Passover. 
" He took bread, blessed and brake it, and gave it to 
his disciples, and said, take, eat ; this is my body. And 
he took the cup and gave thanks, and gave it to them, 
saying, drink ye all of it : For this is my blood of the 
New Testament, which is shed for many for the re- 
mission of sins." To his disciples who remembered the 

K 



146 



THE NEW COVENANT'. 



similar words^ which he h^d used on a former occasion, 
to inculcate that whosoever would be saved, must be- 
lieve that the price of their salvation was his flesh which 
he would give for the life of the world;, and who had 
answered by the mouth of Peter, " Lord, to whom shall 
we go ? thou hast the words of eternal life/' these words- 
could not appear strange. They perfectly understood 
his meaning. They knew that his hour was come, and 
that this memorial which he left to them of the New 
Testament in his blood was to be to them a pei-petual 
remembrance of the sacrifice of his body and bloody 
and a testimony that the Supreme Being had been 
propitiated by it^, that an atonement had been made^ 
and that all the benefits of the shedding of Christ's 
blood were effectually communicated to those who 
should in faith partake of this institution. They knew 
that as they had commemorated the deliverance of Israel 
and partaken of God's covenant with his people, by 
feasting on the Paschal Lamb, so by breaking the bread 
and drinking the cup of the New Testament in the 
blood of Jesus Christ, they were to commemorate the 
deliverance of the people of God, of all true believers 
from the bondage of sin and keep the new covenant 
sealed with his blood, and thereby be united in a holy 
communion with their divine master until the day, when 
they should be really and effectually united with him in 
the kingdom of heaven. 



lTNION with CHRIST. 



147 



The worthy communicant then really becomes miitecl 
with Christ, he eats his flesh and drinks his blood by 
faith, he sees the body of his Redeemer bleeding npon 
the cross, he receives the assurance that all the benefits 
of the sacrifice of this blessed body and blood are 
imparted to him, even the remission of his sins, and the 
full hope of a happy immortality, and he feels the 
accomplishment of these words of Jesus Christ : 

Lo, I am with you alway even unto the end of the 
world." 

The slight difference there is in the narrations of the 
three evangelists is an additional proof that they did not 
think that the bread and the wine had been converted 
into the body and blood of Jesus, and that the bread 
which he held in his hand had become his body, or that 
the wine, which was in the cup had been turned into 
his blood. 

St. Matthew and St. Mark have only recorded these 
words, Take, eat, this is my body :" resting satisfied 
with the bare enunciation of the fact. But St. Luke 
who wrote after them, when the words of our Lord had, 
no doubt, been more generally discussed and examined 
both by Jews and Gentiles, has completed the discourse 
and said This is my body, which is given for you : 
this do in remembrance of me." This clearly means. 
By doing this you v/ill partake of the sacrifice of my 
body^ which you now signify and will continue to com- 

K 2 



148 THE BLOOD OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 

memorate^ as you have been keeping the memorial of 
the j)assover. 

Again, the two first evangelists say that he took the 
cup and said : Drink ye all of it : for this is my blood 
of the New Testament, which is shed for many : " for 
the remission of sins" being added by St. Matthew. 
The third says : Likewise also the cup after supper, 
saying, this cup is the New Testament in my blood, 
which is shed for you." This variation in St. Luke 
clearly shows, that he did not think that the cup, or 
rather the wine in the cup, was the real blood of Christ, 
but that it was the testimony of the New Testament, 
w^hich was to be sealed with his blood, which he was 
then about to shed. Even the words for you," which 
he uses here instead of " for many for the remission, of 
sins," show that at the time he wrote, it was the general 
belief that Jesus, in speakmg to his apostles, spoke to 
all the members of his Church, that the many for whose 
sins his blood w^as shed, were to do merely that which 
his disciples did in his presence ; and that, as his 
disciples could not believe that they were actually eating 
the body and drinking the blood of him who was speak- 
ing to them, neither were those, who followed them 
and believed, to do any more than take this bread and 
drink this cup, in order to have imparted to them the 
spiritual grace of the communion of his body and blood, 
for the remission of their sins. 



THE FRUIT OF THE VINE. 



149 



St. Matthew and St. Pvlark place this declaration of 
Jesus : " But I say unto you, I will not drink hence- 
forth of this fruit of the vine/' &c. immediately after he 
has said to his apostles, in giving them the cup : drink 
ye all of it : for this is my blood of the New Testament." 
St. Luke places it before he takes the bread, and while 
they were still eating the passover. This difference of 
time evidently proves that they all believed that the 
contents of the cup was simply the fruit of tiie vine both 
before and after Christ called it his blood, and that it 
had not undergone any change of substance in conse- 
quence of his words. 

Let us now consider whether the words in the sixth 
chapter of St. John, in w'hich our Lord so strongly urges 
upon all the necessity of eating his flesh and drinking 
his blood, in order that they may have life, have an 
immediate reference to the sacrament of eucharist. 
When he instituted this feast on the sacrifice, he told 
his apostles to take the bread from his hands, because 
this was his body, and he gave them likewise the cup, 
and told them. Drink ye all of it : For this is my blood 
of the New Testament : but he attached no penalty to 
those, who should not do it. It is true he commands 
all to drink of it, and so all Christians are bound to seal 
their faith and love with this New Testament in his 
blood : nevertheless, he does not say. Do this, or else 
you cannot be saved, you have no life in you ; but, do 



150 Christ's discourse to the jews. 

this in remembiance of me." It is not so in his 
discourse to the Jews. Not only he had said : " I am 
the living bread, which came down from heaven : if any 
man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever, and the 
bread, that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for 
the life of the world ;" but he had added most empha- 
tically these words : V erily, verily, I say unto you. 
Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink 
his blood, YE HAVE NO LIFE IN YOU." Therefore the 
language which he used on these tv*^o occasions has to 
some extent a different purport. It is plain that he 
requires here faith on him whom God has sent, as 
necessary to salvation, and he commands all, who will 
have ererlasting life, to believe, that he is the living- 
bread, and that the bread, which he gave is his flesh, 
which he gave for the life of the world. The partaking 
of the sacrifice of his body and blood is the confession 
of this belief, is the pledge of our redemption, and the 
testimony that he is the author and finisher of our faith. 
But it is evident, that he did not order it as absolutely 
necessary for salvation, as the only act through which 
men could obtain everlasting life. The sacrament 
which he instituted for this purpose is baptism in his 
blood, that is, regeneration through his blood, of which 
ivatery and not wine, was to be the outv\^ard sign. He 

* " He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that 
believeth not shall be damned." Mark xvi. 16, 



REGENERATION 



lol 



enforced tlie miportance of this doctrine in the same 
emphatic manner, when he said to Nicodemiis : Verily^ 
verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water 
and of the spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of 
God." Accordingly his very last words to his disciples 
were a command to baptize all those whom they taught 
and who believed in him, as we see in the last chapter 
of St. Matthew's gospel. " And Jesus came and spake 
unto them, saying, All power is given unto me in heaven 
and earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations^ 
baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the 
Son and of the Holy Ghost : Teaching them to observe 
ail things whatsoever I have commanded you : and lo, I 
am with you alway, even unto the end of the world." 

These words are the completion of the discourse of our 
"Saviour as recorded by St. John ; and the outward 
testimony that he left to his disciples, that he is ivith 
ihem alwaij, even unto the end of the world, is the 
sacrament of his body and blood, which he instituted 
at his last supper, as a perpetual memorial of his own 
sacrifice. It is for this reason that this holy insti- 
tution is called the Lord's Supper, c(Ena Domini, 
and the partaking of it is called breaking bread," 
as w^e see in the Acts of the Apostles — ^^"And they 
continued stedfastly in the apostles' doctrine, and in 
■breaking of bread and in prayers " — Acts ii. 42. 
This expression proves very clearly that the Apostles 



I 

152 FEAST UPON A SACRIFICE. 

taught the new converts, who were Jews, perfectly 
familiar with the practice of partaking of sacrifices, and 
especially with the purport of the passover, that this 
breaking of bread was a feast upon a sacrifice, was the 
participation of Christ's body and blood, but not that 
the bread was changed into his flesh ; which would have 
been as unnecessary, as it was repugnant to Christ's 
purpose (to say the least of it), in order to communicate 
to all believers the benefits of the sacrifice, namely their 
spiritual union with God, through Christ, and the remis- 
sion of their sins. For the evident intention of this 
institution is, as St. Paul teaches, to shew the Lord's death 
till he come. Now the Chiistian is to figure to himself 
the bleeding body of Christ, as it lay really dead, offered 
up a victim for the ransom of men. So by eating the 
bread, and drinking the cup, he quite as efifectually 
partakes of this victim, once offered, as those who after 
a sacrifice feasted on a part of the victim which had just 
been ofifered for them. 

Whereas the idea that the bread has become the flesh 
of Christ necessarily removes our mind from the actual 
body of Christ, bleeding upon the cross and directs our 
faith to that new body which we imagine to be exposed 
before us. Therefore while it remains thus before our 
eyes, it must draw to itself all our hope and be the 
centre of all our devotional feelings. No wonder then 
that in their explanation of this new tenets after it had 



EFFECT OF THE NEW TENET. 



153 



taken a firm hold in the belief of men, the priests were 
obliged to lay aside the real sacrifice of the body and 
blood of Christ and to say that, as that body is now 
alive, it follows that mider the species of bread alone 
the body of Christ is united to his blood, to his soul, 
and to his divinity ; for he can no longer be divided. 
So this ofifering which is called the sacrifice of the mass, 
by their own showing, is no sacrifice at all, any more 
than it is an ofiering : because there cannot be a sacri- 
fice, without a victim, and there is no victim without 
shedding of blood or death, and without shedding of 
blood is no remission — (Heb. ix. 22.) 

It cannot be a commemoration of a sacrifice since they 
say that they ofier and receive the body of Jesus Christ, 
such as it is now living and animate, united to his soul 
and to his divinity. Whereas the sacrament is neces- 
sarily a commemoration and a communion of his body 
as it lay deprived of life ; and by this commemoration 
we become partakers of his risen body and entitled 
through faith in his death to be united with him in the 
glory of his resurrection. 

It was only as the ancient practice of feasting upon a 
sacrifice, and the benefits which this was known to 
confer, were lost sight of, that men began to cloud in 
mysterious allegory the words of Jesus Christ, and by 
degrees this feast upon a sacrifice became a sacrifice, 
an unbloody sacrifice, of which men were no longer to 



154 



ITS EVIL CONSEQUEKCE. 



partake individually as a pledge of their union witli 
Christ and of the remission of their sins, through his 
blood ; but which was to be offered for the remission of 
the sins both of the living and the dead : so the elements 
w^hich originally vv^ere only a figure and a testimony, 
were first exposed and held up for veneration and at 
lasx were actually worshipped as God. 



CHAPTEE XIIL 



"Beloved, believe not every spiiit, but try the spirits, whether 
they are of God : because many false prophets are gone out into 
the world." — 1 John, iv., I. 



Though the Holy Scriptures are and can properly be 
our only rule of faith, for that vain philosophy, against 
which St. Paul cautions his Colossian converts, soon 
began to cloud the simplicity of the Gospel, and the 
works of those ancient writers, who are called the Fathers 
of the Church are too frequently filled with those old 
.wives' fables, which St. Paul recommends Timothy to 
refuse ; yet as erroneous views crept in gradually and 
almost imperceptibly, their testimony, though it is to be 
received with caution, is valuable in many respects. 
However, let me say that, except on subjects which 
were controverted among them, their opinion is often 



156 AMBIGUITY OF THE FATHERS. 

couched in temis so ambiguous, so indefinite, that all 
parties, who afterwards entertained opposite sentiments 
upon disputed points of doctrine, have been in the habit 
of quoting the Fathers, and often the same passage of 
their writings, in support of their respective inter- 
pretations. 

Clemens, Justin, Tertullian, Origen, Theodore t, 
Cyrillus, Jerome, Cyprian, Chrysostom, Ambrose, and 
Augustine, in speaking of the Sacrament, have left words 
which shew that the prevalent opinion in their respective 
times was still, that the bread and wine remained the 
same after consecration, and that they were only signs 
of an inward grace ; notwithstanding many minute 
ceremonies were already used during the third and 
fourth centuries in celebrating the sacrament, to which 
the names of ^'unbloody sacrifice," and holy mysteries," 
were already applied. 

St. Paul, whenever he mentions this sacrament, calls 
it bread, as when he says — " Whosoever shall eat this 
bread and drink this cup of the Lord unworthily shall 
be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord." And 
again — " Let a man therefore examine himself, and so 
let him eat of this bread, and drink of this cup."— 
Clemens says Christ shewed that that was wine which 
was blessed, by saying again, I will no more drink of 
the fruit of the vine." — Ignatius says : " It is one bread, 
which is broken for all." And Irenaeus, one of the 



TESTIMONY OF THE FATHERS. 157 

earliest Fathers, says : He made that cup, which is a 
creature, his body, by which he increaseth our bodies. 
Therefore, when the cup of mixture and the bread, 
which is broken receiveth the word, it is made the sacra- 
ment of the body and blood of Christ, by which the 
substance of our flesh is increased and nourished." He 
says, after consecration, it is a creature and such a 
creature as nourisheth the substance of our flesh. — 
Tertullian expounds the words thus : Christ, taking 
the bread, and distributing it to his disciples, made it 
his body, saying, " This is my body, that is to say, this 
is a figure of my body." — Chrysostom says ; If Christ 
died not, whose sign and whose token is this sacrament P 
The very body of Christ himself is not in the holy 
vessels, but the mystery or sacrament thereof is there 
contained." And Ambrose says : " Before consecration 
it is called another kind ; after consecration the body of 
Christ is signified.'' And again, In eating and 
drinking, we signify the body and blood of Christ, that 
was offered for us." 

Here is how St. Augustine explains these words of 
Jesus, " The words that I speak unto you are spirit and 
life :" Understand ye spiritually that I have spoken 
unto you : ye shall not eat this body that ye see, neither 
shall ye drink that blood, which they shall shed, that 
shall crucify me. I have recommended you a certain 
sacrament ; being spiritually understood it shall give 



158 



SPIRITUAL MEA^^ING. 



vou life.'' This rule, says the same Father, is to 
kept in every allegory, that what is spoker by simi- 
litude be weighed by the meaning of the present place.'' 
Xow St. Paul in the fifth chapter of his epistle to the 
Corinthians teaches us both the place and the circum- 
stances in which this sacrament was instituted, and the 
manner how we are to receive it, when he says : Purge 
ye therefore the old leaven, that ye may be anew lump* 
For even Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us ; 
Therefore let us keep the feast not with old leaven, 
neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but 
with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth," It 
is then a feast of love, of thanksgiving, which is a 
testimony to all, who are w^orthy partakers of it, that 
they are united with Christ, that they have put on the 
new man, that they are become neiv creatures, and 
that they are joined unto the Lord in one spirit. He 
that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit. What ? 
know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy 
Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye 
are not your own ? For ye are bought with a price : 
therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, 
which are God's."— (1 Cor. vi., 19, 20.) This is the 
v.'iiy that we really eat the body of Christ and drink his 
blood, til at we are one with him, and he one with us, 
even ;is ilio 1^'alher and he are one. " Therefore, as St. 
Augustine remarks, it is a dangerous matter, and a 



STo AUGUSTINE g DISTINCTION. 



159 



servitude of the sovl, to take the fsigiis instead of the 
thing that is signified." And we must bear in mind 
these words of St. Jerome. " The Gospel is not in the 
words of Scripture, but in the meaning. It is not in 
the outward show, but in the inner marrow ; not in the 
leaves of word, but in the root of reason ; for the 
letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life/' 

Every body admits that without the sacrament we 
may be saved ; but without the body of Christ v/e have 
no salvation, we cannot be saved. These words of Jesus 
Christ in his discourse to the Jews plainly teach us this 
truth : Except ye eat the Hesh of the Son of man, and 
drink his blood, ye have no life in you/' That is to 
say : Except we have faith in Christ,, trust in his atone- 
ment, and believe that he came from the Father to give 
his body and his blood a sacrifice for the sins of men, 
we cannot obtain everlasting life. St. Augustine had 
this difference in view, when he said : He that 
receiveth not the flesh of Christ, hath no life ; and he 
that receiveth the same hath life, and that for ever. 
The sacrament (of Christ's body) is received of some 
unto life, of some unto destruction ; but the thing itself 
(that is, the flesh of Christ), whereof this is a sacrament, 
is received of all men unto life, and of no man to 
destruction, whoever shall be partaker of it." Now% if 
he had believed that the sacrament, that is, the elements, 
is changed into the body of Christ, he could not have 



160 NATURE OF THE SACRAMENT. 

made, this distinction, since both the worthy and 
unworthy communicants would receive that body, if the 
bread was really changed into its substance. 

This distinction of Augustine perfectly explains these 
words of St. Paul : For as often as ye eat this bread, 
and drink this cup, ye do shev/ the Lord's death till he 
come. Wherefore, whosoever shall eat this bread and 
drink this cup unworthily, shall be guilty of the body 
and blood of the Lord. But let a man examine 
himself, and so let him eat of that bread and drink of 
that cup. For he that eateth unworthily, eateth and 
drinketh damnation to himself, not discerning the Lord's 
body." He that discerneth not the Lord's body is he 
who eating that bread and drinking that cup (as St. 
Paul always calls it) pretends to shew the Lord's death 
for repentant sinners, and yet lives in sin : therefore he 
does not receive him as his Saviour, and is guilty of 
the body and blood of Christy as all unrepenting sinners 
are, and as were the Jews to whom Peter said : Him 
have ye taken, and by wicked hands have crucified 
and slain." 

This sacrament, then, properly understood, is the 
New Testament in the blood of Christ, is the pledge of 
salvation to all men which our Saviour substituted for 
the Passover, which had only been a figure of it, in 
order to perpetuate the memory of their deliverance by 
his death and passion, and to be the means of conveying 



WOKSHIP OF THE ELEMEN^rS. 



161 



the benefits of his body and blood to his faithful and 
penitent followers throiigliout all ages. 

As men went on adding ceremony to ceremony, error 
to error^ and distorting the most simple words of the 
Gospel, they lost sight of the recommendation of St. 
Augustine, wdiich had been before his time the guide 
of the primitive Church, that what is spoken by 
similitude must be weighed by the meaning of the 
present place.'' They forgot that Jesus Christ had 
instituted this sacrament at the feast of the passover, 
just before the sacrifice of his own body and blood; that 
he himself had become that paschal lamb, who delivered 
his peoj)le from sin and death, and that the memory of 
his sacrifice was to be kept by feasting upon this victim, 
which had been offered once for all. They began to 
shew a particular reverence to the elements themselves 
by approaching them and exhibiting them to the peo23le 
with mysterious awe, and by degrees they transferred to 
the figure the adoration owed to the thing signified. 
The bread and wine, instead of being the sign of an 
inw^ard grace, the remembrance of a great sacrifice^ 
which St. Paul teaches us, could never be renewed, 
became themselves a sacrifice, an unbloody sacrifice 
offered again for the living and the dead, before which 
the people bowed their heads to the ground, as the 
heathen of old used to do before the images of their 
Gods, whom they tried to propitiate by their sacrifices. 

L 



162 



PAGAN RITUAL, 



Instead ol the simple prayer taught by Jesus Christ 
himself, in which we ask for our supersubstantial bread, 
the food of our souls, which was in early times the only 
prayer used at the consecration, the commemoration of 
saints, and some even of a rather modern date, was 
introduced. All the paraphernalia of a Pagan sacrifice 
were exhibited by the vestments of the priest, his 
Irequent genuflections, the turning his back to the people,, 
and then his abrupt turning again to the people in 
saying Dominus vobiscum: to all these was added the 
ringing of the bell, as it was used in the sacred mysteries, 
to drive away evil spirits. 



CHAPTEE XIV. 



" But now, after that ye have known God, or rather are known 
of God, how turn ye again to the weak and beggarly elements, 
whereunto ye desire again to be in bondage ? " Gal. iv. 9. 



The end of all that awful reverence showed to the 
bread and wine was first to direct men to the worship of 
Christ's divine person, and to the contemplation of his 
body hanging upon the cross for the expiation of sin ; 
but it was soon followed by the worship of the type of 
that body. Yet the opinions of Christian doctors vvere 
much divided upon the manner in which the body and 
blood of Christ were present in the sacrament, though 
the belief that they actually worshipped and ate the 
body of Christ in the form of the host more and more 
prevailed, with the increase of outward forms and the 
importance w^hich the clergy acquired in the minds of a 
gross and superstitious multitude, to which exterior 

L 2 



164 



INNOCENT THE THIRD, 



shows, mysterious awe and gorgeous apparel liad become 
the elements of all religious emotion. At last at the 
beginning of the thirteenth century, when the Pope, ^vho 
stvled himself the serv^ant of the servants of God, had 
really become the king of kings and the lord of lords. 
Innocent the Third, caused this dogma to be received and 
acknowledged in the Church, as an article of faith. 
This haughty prelate, who then wielded the most abso- 
lute sway, that man did ever possess, since he governed 
even the thoughts of men and made them dread his 
assumed and imaginary power over heaven and hell, vi^as 
he w4io built the temporal power of the popes upon solid 
foundations. He exerted his spiritual power by excom- 
municating the tw^o proudest and most powerful monarchs 
of his time, Philippe Auguste, king of France, and John, 
king of England. 

Though I am going out of my subject, I must tell 
you a few words about excommunication. When an 
excommunication had been launched against a king, all 
the country was laid under an interdict. The priests 
ceased to say mass; all religious ceremonies were 
suspended ; the people could no longer be married, nor 
even have their dead buried with the prayers of the 
Church. The greatest terror prevailed all over the 
land ; the holy relics were taken out of their shrines, 
and the host, which was supposed to be God himself, 
was ixnnovcd from the altars, which were left bare. 



EFFECTS OF EXCOMMUNICATIOX. 166 



The statues of saints were laid fiat on the ground and 
covered with a cloth. The bells of the churches were no 
longer heard : and as, according to the old superstition of 
the Pagan mysteries, from which they had been borrowed, 
bells servT.d to frighten and drive away the powers of 
darkness, the people believed that, by an excommuni- 
cation, the evil spirits were let loose upon the land, upon 
themselves and upon their cattle, and took possession of 
the souls of their friends, who died, whilst it lasted. 

It was Innocent the Third also, who ordered a crusade 
against the A ibigenses, and offered Plenary IndvAgences, 
which should blot out all the sins which they had com- 
mitted from their birth, to all those who would take up 
arms against these early Reformers, who dared to im- 
pugn the pope's authority, and who to some errors con- 
cerning the principle of good and evil of which they 
were accused by their enemies, which some of them possi- 
bly may have held, but which have never been proved, 
joined the condemnation of the v/orship of saints and 
images, and of the material interpretation of the doctrine 
of the real presence,"^ Many men in the flourishing 

* " It would indeed be surprising if, in the middle of so general a 
corruption of religion, they alone had not given way to some 
excesses. Though some remains of the Paulicians and other 
metaphysical heretics were still left at this epoch, it is nevertheless 
very certain that both in the mountains of Savoy and in Narbonnaise 
Gaul, there had been from the 6th century up to this period, numbers 
of true and pious Christians, who, holding all the true and orthodox 
doctrines, had always protested against the superstitions and im- 
postures, which had gi'own into the system, which was then 
flourishing, and whose only crime was that they declaimed against 



166 



T RAN SUBSTANTIATION. 



cities of the province of Langiie d 'oe had always more 
or less openly protested against the false doctrines 
which had gradually crept into the Church; because 
through the darkness of ignorance and barbarism 
spread around them they had preserved up to that 
period the sacred sparks of civil and religious liberty, 
which the promise of the Pope's indulgences and still 
more the allurements of licentiousness and plunder drew 
multitudes to extinguish in rivers of blood. But 
however cruel these wars were, they proved still less 
fatal to humanity than the terrible tribunal of Inquisi- 
tion, which owes its origin to the same pope. 

In the fourth council of the Lateran in Rome, under 
the immediate direction of the Pope himself, this 
pontitf pronounced that the opinion, v>^hich is held this 
day in the Roman Church, relating to the change of 
substance of the bread into the real body of Christ, was 
the only true and orthodox one, and he introduced the 
new term Transuhstantiation to express and represent 
this idea. But whoever will read coolly and dispassion- 
ately the canon of the mass, which was enlarged by 

The vices, tlie power and opulence of the pontiffs and clergy. There 
were no doubt various sects, having their varioiis ideas, just as the 
•htiereut ])odies of monks had their pecuhar rules and practices and 
Mieir special objects of worship: but all those who refuted the 
superstitions of the time, and asserted that the dominion which the 
popes had usurped over Christians, was unlavv^ful and tyrannical. 
w(Mv nicluded m tlje same category as odious Albigenses : thev were 
rhcrelore persecuted, tortured, and put to death by the leoates of the 
J ope inid tlie lu'iuisitors." 



SPIRITUAL UNION WITH CHRIST« 167 

degrees^, as new ideas had taken root^ will feel convinced 
that the words used in it do not imply the idea of 
transubstantiation. It is very evident that the framers 
of these words did not intend that the host should be 
worshipped, and viewed as Christ himself ; but they 
prayed God to receive it as a sacrifice of praise and 
thanksgiving in memory of the passion of his Son Jesus 
Christ-, that all those who through it were made par- 
takers of the body and blood of Christ, might be filled 
with ail heavenly blessings and graces. 

Some Roman Catholics, who, in the glow of religious 
zeal, have nourished this dogma with all the fervour of 
a devout imagination, will sometimes shrink at the idea 
of eating the real flesh of Christ (but not of drinking 
his blood, for now the priests, against the express 
command of Christ himself, keep the cup exclusively to 
themselves,) and they will say that they do it 
spiritually. For when men fairly examine themselves, 
and reason rightly and candidly, they must all come to 
this conclusion, that our union with God through Christ 
is the work of faith, and therefore must, and cannot 
be other than spiritual. So that whether we believe 
that the substance of the bread is changed, or that the 
bread is the means of communicating to us the body of 
Christ, which suffered for us on the cross, we cannot 
form any other idea, but that of a spiritual communion. 
But there is this difference, that the believer in transub- 



168 EVIL OF TRANSUBSTANTIATION. 

stantialion rests on the contemplation of the bread, 
which he receives ; whereas he, who has been taught 
the true orthodox doctrine, contemplates the Redeemer 
dying for his sins, taking upon himself the burden of 
every repentant sinner : he feeds upon this victim more 
really even than if he had given him a piece of his own 
flesh to eat; he enjoys the perfect assurance that he is 
washed from ail his stains through the blood of his 
Saviour, and is reconciled with God, who made Him 
sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might become the 
righteousness of God in him." 

The real harm, the great abuse of the belief in 
transubstantiation is in the adoration paid to the elements, 
when they are exposed to the worship of the people 
and all the ceremonies, all the reverence used by the 
priests in exposing and handling those elements, while 

* "Besides though, by the consecration of the piiest, the host 
could really be changed into God, those who bow down and worship 
it, can never be morally certain, that they have worshipped any 
thing more than mere bread, because by the eleventh canon of the 
seventh session of the Council of Trent, it is thus decreed : * Si 
quis dixerit in ministris, dum Sacramenta conficiunt et conferunt, 
non requiri intentionem saltern faciendi quod facit Ecclesia, ana- 
thema sit.' 

* If any one should say that the intention at least of doing that 
which the Church does, is not requisite in ministers, while they 
l)erforra and bestow the sacraments, let him be accursed.' So 
according to this canon, no one is ever perfectly sure, not only 
whether the host has been really consecrated, but also, whether 
absolution hi the Sacrament of Penance has been bestowed, or any 
of the other sacraments has been really performed, for, ' what man 
knowetli the things of a man save the spirit of man which is in 
liim?'— (1 Cor. ii. U.) 

Tliis is one of those awful consequences of looldng up to man and 
not to Christ alone for Salvation and the gifts of the Spirit, of which 
i"ew Roman Catholics are even aware." 



CAUTION TO ROMAN CATHOLICS. 



169 



they are intended to draw the veneration of the wor- 
shippers to Christ, entirely fail in their intention ; for 
they really divert the mind from the dying Saviour to 
the adoration of dumh objects from which those, whom 
the Holy Spirit has been pleased to enlighten by his 
word, shrink with sorrow and disgust. 

But those who hold such a language, namely, that 
they spiritually eat the body of Christ, ought not to 
remain in union with the Pvoman priesthood, for by 
speaking thus they put themselves out of the pale of 
that Church and fall under its curse. In the eighth 
canon of the thirteenth session of the Council of Trent, 
it is declared : Si quis dixerit Christum in Eucharistia 
exhibitum, spiritualiter tantum manducari, et non etiairi 
sacramentaliter ac realiter anathema sit."^ 

If time permitted me, I might draw your attention to 
the ceremonies of the mass many of which are taken 
from the Pagan Ritual, though we are now told that 
they are an imitation of the old Jewish service. f Even 
the custom of raising up the host for adoration, is at 
least similar to the practice used by the heathen jDriests, 

* "If any one should sav, that Christ presented in the Eucharist 
is eaten only spiritually^ and not also sacramentaUy and really, let 
him be accursed." 

f Joannes Boemus Aubanus Teutonicus, in his curious and rare 
book, entitled " Omnium Gentium Mores, Leges et Putus," says in 
speaking of Egypt: Nam ut Philippus Beroaldus super Apuleianum 
Asinum scribit, pleraque etiam in ^Egyptiorum relligione translata 
in relligionem iiostram sunt, ut hneae vestes, derasa sacerdotum 
capita, vertujlnes in altari, pompa sacrificalis, niusicse modulaminaj 



170 



PAGAN ORIGIN OF THE MASS. 



when they oHered an unbloody sacrifice, that is to say, 
a sacrifice of cakes made of salt, flour, and water. They 
had their face turned to the altar, and they lifted up the 
}nola or cake, to show it up to the people. The 
practice of saying mass, before noon, proceeds from the 
same source : and the very word 7nasSj missa has a 
Pagan origin. The priest or an acolyte used to turn to 
the people at the end of a sacrifice and say : Ite missa 
est (oblatio), id est," Go, the offering has been made, 
has been sent up (to the god). It is still the formula, 
v/hich the priest uses, when after communion, he turns 
round to the people and says aloud : Ite, missa est." 
In our French missals, these words are rendered by, 
Allez, il ya permission," which translation is the 
meaning of the words Ite, missio est," *used by the 
heathen priesthood, when no sacrifice or oblation had 
been made. In tlie third and fourth centuries, when so 
many ceremonies had been borrowed from heathen 
pageantry, and Christian priests and bishops had 

ador itioiies, aliaqne id genus complura. (*) He Avrote in 1520, as 
he says himself ; and that he was a credulous and sincere Roman 
C.itholic, the whole tenor of his book amply testifies. Besides the 
book v/as printed by permission of his C cesarean Majesti/.—Antwer^p 
edition, 1571. 

(*) For as it is mentiond by Philip Beroaldo, (a learned subject 
of the Tope of the 15th century, who wrote commentaries on an 
allegory of ApuleiuK, called The Golden Ass") many things have 
also been transferred from the Egyptian religion into ours, such as 
flaxen vestments, the shaven heads of priests, the turnings about the 
altar, the sacrificial pomp, the harmonies of music, bows or adora- 
tions and most things of that kind. 



THE USE OF SALT. 



]71 



become fond of gorgeous and imposing display, these 
words, " Ite, missa est," were first addressed to the 
catechmiiens, i. e. those who had not been baptized, 
merely because they had been used to them in the 
heathen temples, in order that they might leave the 
basilic or church before the communion was administered ; 
w^hich shews that the morning service, afterwards called 
mass, was then not yet considered as a real sacrifice. 
But when the idea of a new sacrifice had crept in, these 
dimissory words were transferred to the end of the mass, 
after the communion, to express to tlie people that an 
offering had been made and was consummated : So that 
the modern use of these v»'ords entirely resembles that 
which the heathen priests made of them. 

Another observation that I will make, is that salt v»^as 
used by the heathen Romans to drive away evil spirits, 
as it v/as suj^posed. So water mixed with salt vvas 
sprinkled by the priest on the people for that purpose ; 
this was called a lustration. Tt is related of the emperor 
Valentinian, as a mark of his Christian zeal, that one 
day, when he was only an officer in the service of Julian, 
he had followed the emperor to a pagan temple, which 
his duty as a soldier demanded. The priest, who stood 
at the gate to make the lustrations sprinkled such a 
profusion of holy water upon Valentinian, that the latter, 
undismayed by the presence of the emperor, was kindled 
with anger and struck the priest a violent blow. Valen- 



172 



THE USE OF HOLY WATER. 



tinian did not suspect that the Christian priesthood, 
whose influence he afterwards laboured so much to 
establish, would soon adopt the same custom and attach 
to it the same idea, which that heathen priest did. 

In all Roman Catholic countries the morning service 
on Sundays begins with the blessing of water. (La 
benediction de I'eau.) After the Exorcism, or the act 
of driving away evil spirits, and the prayer over the 
salt, which the priest mixes with the water, he says 
aloud (in Latin, of course) this prayer, which I 
translate literally from my paroissien or missal. 

God, whose strength is invincible, whose empire 
cannot be shaken, whose triumph is ever magnificent ; 
who curbest and castest down the formidable enemy, 
which attacks us with so much violence, we suppli- 
cate thee with trembling and confidence, to extend 
thy blessing over this water, in order that by its 
being sprinkled upon us, we may obtain of thy 
mercy the grace, which we ask of thee of being 
preserved from the attacks of the impure Spirit, 
and of being always guided by the Holy Spirit: Through 
our Lord Jesus Christ." Then the priest takes the 
rjoupiUon or aspersorium, which is a kind of round 
brush, dips it in the bucket, sprinkles the water first 
over the clergy and acolytes ; afterwards he goes round 
the church sprinkling right and left, the bucket of 
holy water being carried by the sexton, who accom- 



THE USE OF THE SIGN OF THE CROSS. ITS 

panics him. As he passes, the people, who receive the 
drops of water upon their faces, make a sign of the cross. 

It is also for this j)m*pose, that a benitier or holy 
water vessel is fixed near the doors of all churches, that, 
as the people come in, they may dip their fingers into it, 
and he enabled to drive away the evil spirits conjointly 
by means of the holy water and of the sign of the cross. 
You have been told that the sign of the cross is only a 
sign, which is used to put us in mind of the instrument 
of our redemption. It may have been so, when first 
used by Christians, or it may have been adopted by 
them as an outward mark of their belief in Christ's 
redemption by his death upon the cross : but it soon 
changed its object; and certainly now, those who make 
it, have no such thoughts in their minds. It is more 
used as a talisman or charm, than as a mark of self- 
denial ; therefore it is because a virtue is supposed to be 
attached to that action, namely the virtue of driving 
away evil spirits, that I object to it. How often have I 
heard priests, and English priests too, say in their 
public instructions, that a sign of the cross well made 
will be sufficient to drive away all evil spirits ! 

Salt is also used for the same purpose in the form of 
Baptism, as it is now administered in the church of 
Rome. It is put in the mouth of the person to be 
baptized, that it may be to him a ]?ropitiation for 
eternal life, previous to the sprinkling, vvhich has been 



174 



SALT USED IN BAPTISM. 



substituted to the dipping in water, whicli is the ceremony 
appointed by Christ, and the only one, which was 
practised by the primitive Churcb. This superstition 
was introduced when the baneful practice of complying 
with the Heathen Customs, in order to facilitate the 
conversion of the Gentiles bad been adopted by the old 
Roman Church. A little grain of salt is put in the 
child's mouth to preserve him from the infernal spirits, 
as it was used by the Gentiles in their propitiatory offer- 
ings to redeem them from the vengeance of the Stygian 
or InfeiTial Gods.^ 

Parvapetuiit Manes, pietaspro clivite gi'ata est 

Munere ; noii avidos Styx habet ima Deos. 
Tegiila porreciis satis est velata coronis, 
Et parcas fruges, ^arca^ife mica salis. 

Fastorum, Lib. 2. 

Even bells continue to be exorcised and baptized 
vvith salt and holy water, before they are put up in 
steeples, in order that they may be endowed with the 
virtue of driving away the spirits of the air, 

* The Priest takes spittle out of his mouth and puts it in the ears, 
eyes and nostrils of the child he is going to baptize, which is also 
a compliance -with an old Roman superstition, though b}^ mixing it 
with earth, there is a shew of imitating the act of Christ, when he 
restored sight to the blind man. Spittle among the ancients was 
esteemed a charm against all kind of fascinations : so it was the 
custom of nurses to purify the children by spittle, and anoint the 
organs of the face with it on the Dies lustricus, the day the child 
was named. 

frontem atque uda labella 
(*) Infami digito, et lustralibus ante salivis 
Expiat, urentes oculos inhibere perlta 

Persius Sat>) 2. 

The middle finger. 



CHAPTEE XV. 



" I acknowledged my sin unto thee, and mine iniquity have 1 not 
hid. I said, I will confess my transgressions unto the Lord; and 
thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin." Psalm xxxii. 5, 



I MUST say a few words upon the five sacraments which 
in process of time were added to the two sacraments 
ordered by Christ, no doubt to make up the mystic 
number, seven. 

Confirmation is a religious ceremony, which I have 
no doubt, has been practised by most churches from the 
earliest days of Christianity, in imitation of the Apostles, 
who laid their hands upon those who had been baptized, 
as we see in the eighth chapter of the Acts : " Then 
laid they their hands upon them, and they received the 
Holy Ghost." This ceremony of confirmation appears 
to have been introduced after the right of administering 
baptism had been vested in the bishops, to prevent that 



176 



CONFIRMATION, 



(jonliision which early prevailed, and of which St. Paul 
complains to the Corinthians, arising from the practice 
of the new converts considering themselves as particu- 
larly attached to him, hy whom they had heen baptized. 
But when the hounds of a Church had been greatly 
enlarged, by numerous conversions in the surrounding 
districts, the bishop conferred this right upon presbyters 
and chorepiscopi, or country-bishops, reserving to 
himself the confirmation of the ba]3tism, which had 
been conferred by others. It is very evident that this 
confirmation was not then considered a sacrament as 
distinct from baptism, but that it was a part of the 
baptismal rite. Even this ceremony has far departed in 
the Roman Church from the simple laying of hands, 
which was the only thing the apostles did ; and the 
holy chrism, or consecrated oil mixed with balm, forms 
now the principal part of the ceremony ; since no one 
can be considered as confirmed, unless he has been 
anointed with it. 

Order or ordination is likewise a religious rite, to 
admit men into the ministry. It first consisted only in 
the imposition of hands upon those who had been tried 
and approved as fit to be deacons or presbyters, accord- 
ing to this advice of St. Paul to Timothy " Lay hands 
suddenly on no man." 

Marriage is an honorable union, as St. Paul calls it, 
wliicli, no doubt, was celebrated by a religious ceremony 



MARRIAGE. 



177 



among the first Christians : but it has become a sacra- 
ment by an abuse of the term sacramentum. The 
words of St. Paul in the last chapter of his epistle to 
the Hebrews^, and those which he addressed to the 
Ephesians in the fifth chapter of his epistle^ are quoted 
in a garbled state in order to support this new interpre- 
tation of its being a sacrament. Honor abile connuhium, 
marriage is honour able.,, ^vX the priests do not insist 
upon the words which are annexed, namely 'Hn omnibus, 
in all,'' and they cut them off, because priests are now^ 
forbidden to marry ; so a priest, who should follow the 
injunction of St. Paul, would be dishonoured for ever 
according to the prejudices of his church. These words 
of St. Paul to the Ephesians, This is a great mystery, 
but I speak concerning Christ and the Church,'' are 
likewise brought forward as if St. Paul had used them 
to prove that marriage was a sacrament, in the same 
sense in which we now understand the word, in speaking 
of the two sacred institutions, ordered by Christ to those 
who believe. The mystery of which St. Paul speaks 
here is the union between Christ and his Church, 
namely all true believers, which he has compared to the 
union between a man and his wife. " For no man ever 
hated his own fiesh ; but nourisheth it and cherisheth it, 
even as the Lord the Vhurch : for we are members of 
his body, of his flesh, and of his bones. For this cause 
shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be 

M 



17S 



USE OF THE WORD SACRAMENT. 



joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one fiesli. 
This is a gresit mystery : hut I speak concerning Christ 
and the Church." 

In the Vulgate translation, such as we have it now, 
the words are : Sacramentum hoc magnum est^ ego 
autem dico in Christo et Ecclesia, instead of de Christo 
et ecclesia : therefore they are rendered in English thus : 
" This is a great sacrament^ but I speak in Christ and in 
the Church." Thus you see, in this short sentence, there 
are two very important alterations : sacrament is used 
instead of mystery, and the preposition in is substituted 
to the preposition de, concerning. In the French 
Doctrine chretienne, in which this sacrament is ex- 
plained, and these words are quoted to shew marriage 
to be a sacrament, the conjunction autem, but, is left 
out, because the sense which it is thus attempted to 
give to the sentence, would appear too awkward with it. 
Because Jerome uses the word Sacramentum for 
mystery here, as he does even in many parts of the 
Old Testament to express any sacred ceremony, the 
word is abused to apply it to an entirely different mean- 
ing from the original.* 

However, the objections to these three religious rites 
being classed as Sacraments are of little importance to 
me ; because I do not consider that principles are in- 
volved in it, therefore I will not insist any longer upon 
* See Bingham's antiquities on Baptism, 



PENANCE AND CONFESSION. 



179 



the subject. But the two other additional sacraments, 
Penance, and Extreme Unction demand a more serious 
consideration, because it is through them that the 
priests claim the right of governing men's consciences 
and of holding the keys of heaven and hell. — First,. as 
to Penance. I begin by declaring to you, that I have 
no personal objection to confession, which is one of the 
principal parts of this pseudo-sacrament. If I was not 
fully persuaded that it proceeds from an erroneous 
principle, that it has a wrong tendency, I would willingly 
submit to it ; for I do not consider it a hardship at all, 
at least to myself. I would feel no repugnance whatever 
to open my most secret thoughts to a discreet and 
prudent priest (and there are many such), did not my 
conscience tell me that it is wrong to do so, in the ex- 
pectation that the absolution, which he would pronounce 
over me is necessary, nay, is indispensable to the 
remission of my sins. 

The first words w^ith which Jesus opened his mission 
as a reformer, as a deliverer,, were : " Repent, for the 
kingdom of heaven is at hand." It is to repentance and 
to a newness of life that he has promised the forgiveness 
of sins. Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man 
be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." And 
to bear fruits worthy of penance, we must believe that 
pardon of sins comes through him: ''And as Moses 
lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the 

M 2 



180 



REPENTANCE YGR SINS. 



Son of man be lifted up : that whoever believeth on 
him should not perish, but have eternal life." 

His apostles, therefore, whom he had ordered to teach 
all nations to observe all things whatsoever he had com- 
manded them, proclaimed to the assembled multitude 
that God having raised his Son Jesus had sent him to 
bless them, in turning every one of them from his 
iniquities. And after setting forth that those things, 
which God before had shewed by the mouth of his 
prophets, that Christ should suffer, he had fulfilled, 
they shewed to the people how they could escape from 
the wrath to come and obtain mercy through Jesus 
Christ, saying : Repent ye therefore and be converted, 
that your sins may be blotted out, y>^hen the times of 
refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord : 
and he shall send Jesus Christ, which before was 
preached unto you" — (Acts iii. 19.) 

Salvation then comes through faith in Christ ; and 
there can be no true faith without a change of life and 
a repentance for sins. As Jesus Christ instituted the 
holy sacrament of his body and blood to be a perpetual 
remembrance of his death for sin, so all who come to it 
must truly repent of their sins. Now what is repentance ? 
It is sorrow for having committed sins, which have 
offended God, and have been the cause of the death and 
sufi'erings of our Redeemer, and not sorrow for having 
deserved punishment by those sins. For godly 



PENANCE CONTRARY TO SCRIPTURE. 



181 



sorrow worketh repentance to salvation not to be repented 
of : but the sorrow of the world worketh death" — 
(2 Cor. vii. 10.) Then all those who experience that 
godly sorrow are justified freely by God's grace through 
the redemption that is in Christ Jesus : Whom God hath 
set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, 
to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins 
that are past, through the forbearance of God" — 
(Rom. iii. 25.) 

Now we are told, against the express words of God, that 
this godly sorrow is of no use to us^ to obtain forgive- 
ness for the sins that are past, unless we do penance for 
them and obtain the absolution of a priest. The 
sacrament of penance is entirely founded upon the 
doctrine of good works, and it was not invented till 
after the belief that God could be appeased by fastings 
and other bodily mortifications, vdiich St. Paul calls the 
works of the law and a confidence in which he took so 
much pain to remove from the Jewish converts, had 
taken root in the Christian Church. Penance, therefore, 
as it is understood by the Roman Church, tends to 
turn men away from that godly sorrow, which worketh 
repentance unto salvation, by making them sorry for 
having brought chastisement upon themselves, and 
induces them to seek to escape from the flames of hell 
or purgatory by saying a set of prayers, visiting 
Churches, praying before a crucifix or a shrine with 



182 



ITS EVIL TENDENCY. 



oiU-stretclied arms, by fasting and by imposing upon 
themselves various mortifications. Besides^ it tends to 
create the confidence that, when the penance imposed 
bv the priest has been fulfilled, ve are clean, we are 
washed, we are justified. It is so much so, that when 
penitents go to confession, they begin their examination 
from their last confession, because the sins which have 
been confessed, are supposed to hav^e been forgiven. 
This does not prevail only with the lukevfarm and 
indifierent ; but it is the practice even of those, that 
are most earnest and sincere. So in point of fact the 
priest is practically every thing and Christ nothing. 

But, we are told, we must confess our sins to the priest, 
without which we cannot obtain absolution. — The con- 
fession of sins is mentioned in many paits of the Old 
and the New Testament. But how did men confess 
their sins P They had not certainly recourse to auricular 
confession : no Roman catholic will venture to assert 
such a thing. They confessed their sins by demanding 
aloud forgiveness of God for having offended him and 
making a general confession, as is now practised in the 
Church of England. The Roman Catholics, in support 
of confession, quote this verse of the 18th chapter of St. 
Luke's gospel : And the nublican, standing afar off, 
would not lift up so much as his eyes to heaven, but 
smott^ upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me a 
sinner." Now these are the words of Jesus Christ 



REMISSIOX OF SINS. 



183 



himself, by which he teaches us how we must confess 
our sins ; and this is the practice, which we must follow. 
We must confess our sins to God, he alone has a right 
and power to forgive. 

But they say : You must he absolved of your sins, 
because the priests have the power of retaining 
and remitting sins, according to these words, which 
our Lord spoke to Peter : " I will give unto thee 
the keys of the kingdom of heaven ; and whatsoever 
thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and 
whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in 
heaven"— (Mat. xvi. 19.) This is another literal inter- 
pretation which has led to many abuses. Is it not 
evident that these words refer to the preaching of Peter 
and the other apostles ? Christ said these words to 
signify that he would send them to announce pardon 
through faith in him, and that they v/ere to declare that 
he that believeth on him is not condemned ; but he 
that believeth not, is condemned already, because he 
hath not believed in the name of the only bes'otten Son 
of God" — (John iii. 18.) Accordingly, when, after 
his resurrection, the time was at last arrived, Vvhen they 
should go and teach all nations, he breathed on them 
and said unto them. "Receive ye the Holy Ghost: 
Whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them, 
and whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained" — 
(John XX. 23.) Therefore his apostles, to whom this 



184 HOW UNDERSTOOD BY THE APOSTLES. 

privilege of remitting sins was imparted, did proclaim and 
all his ministers are to proclaim to all generations that 
Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom the Jews crucified, whom 
God raised from the dead, is the stone which was set at 
nought of the builders, which is become the head of the 
corner. Neither is there saltation in any other : for 
there is none other name under heaven given among 
men, whereby we must be saved — (Acts. iv. 10.) This 
is the way in which the power of remitting and of 
retaining sins was conferred upon the apostles and upon 
all those who were to preach the gospel : it is thus they 
were to hold the keys of the kingdom of heaven : their 
mission was, as St. Paul tells us, to preach Christ 
crucified, unto the Jews a stumbling block, and unto 
the Greeks, foolishness ; but unto them which are called, 
both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, who 
is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sancti- 
fication, and redemption. St. Luke explains in a very 
clear manner the interpretation given by the Apostles 
to the power of remitting sins, with which they were 
invested by their Divine Master. For, instead of using 
the second person, as St. John does, he relates the 
substance of the words of Christ to his apostles, saying : 
"And he said unto them. Thus it is written, and thus it 
behoved Christ to suffer, and to rise again the third 
day : And that repentance and remission of sins should 
be preached in his name among all nations" — (Luke 



MISTAKEN SUPPOSITION. 



185 



xxiii.) Accordingly Peter told the Jews, who said 
unto him and to the rest of the apostles, men and 
brethren ; what shall we do, repent and be baptized 
every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the 
r-emissiGn of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the 
Holy Ghost" — (Acts ii. 37.) Now is there any Roman 
priest, who would venture to assert that in this or any 
other circumstance, the apostles insisted upon the ob- 
ligation of auricular confession and private absolution, 
or that they ever did anything more, than declare, 
" repent and be converted that your sins may be blotted 
out" — (Acts iii. 19.) 

I have sometimes heard this remark made by some 
priests in the course of those familiar instructions, in 
which they explain the tenets of their Church. 

Confession must be of divine origin, for it is so 
repugnant to the pride and feelings of the human heart, 
that nothing but the divine sanction could have made 
men submit to it." Now these gentlemen's own feelings, 
not to say prejudices, prevented them from reflecting on 
the bearing of the words, which they thus uttered ; for 
there is nothing ever so humiliating to his pride, or ' so 
galling to his spirit, which man will not submit to, pro- 
vided he has been taught to believe, that he will appease 
an angry deity and obtain his favour, by so doino\ We 
have only to cast a glance on all religions both ancient 
and modern, in order to be convinced of this f^ict. 



186 



ORIGIN OF PRIVATE COXFESSION. 



But confession, so far from being lost in the dark 
mazes of antiquity, is one of those pratices, ivJiich have 
crept into the Church, whose origin we can the most 
clearly trace. We have seen before that those, who had 
denied Christ, to avoid persecution, and who afterwards 
repented of their apostacy, were obliged to do penance 
and confess their fault publicly and likewise that some 
punishment, of which public confession formed a part, 
was imposed upon those, who had become infamous by 
any notorious crime. In the time of Leo the First, 
called the great, about the middle of the fifth century, 
public offenders were allowed to confess their crimes 
privately to a priest appointed for that purpose. From 
that time private confession began to be practised and 
grew more and more in use : but it w^as not imposed 
upon all members of the Church as of absolute neces- 
sity till it was ordered, together with the doctrine of 
transubstantiation by the fourth council of Lateran 
through the authority of Innocent the Third. 

Then though-the practice of auricular confession had 
been partially followed and had gradually increased from 
the middle of the fifth century to the end of the twelfth ; 
yet it had not been hitherto obligatory. The faithful 
were not bound to subm.it to it under pain of eternal 
damnation. Besides, there was not for a long time any 
declaratory absolution, " I absolve thee," as is used at 
prcMcnt ill the Roman Church : but the priest simply 



ABSOLUTION. 



187 



uttered a prayer, asking Gocl that " he would be pleased 
to absolve the believing penitent." This is a proof that 
it was considered merely as a matter of discipline and 
not as a divine institution. 

This deprecatory form of pardon is still used by the 
Greeks up to this time : because the practice of confes- 
sion was introduced in the Greek as well as in the Latin 
Church, or rather it began in the former. But it never 
was considered by it as absolutely necessary in all 
cases, as it was afterwards made in the Latin Church. 
Although the Church had exalted itself above the throne 
through the weakness of the emperors of Constantinople 
and the fanaticism of the people ; although many 
extravagant pretensions had been set up and numberless 
superstitions had been adopted by the bishops and 
clergy of that Church, yet they never j^resumed so 
much, as to claim the divine authority of cancelling sins. 
The celebrated Chrysostom, that zealous and ill-treated 
patriarch of Constantinople says on the confession of 
sins : " I do not say to thee that thou shouldst parade 
thy sins and accuse thyself, but that thou shouldst obey 
the prophet, who says to thee, ' Discover thy way unto 
the Lord,' confess thy sins to God, let this judgment 
take place without witnesses, let none but God see thy 
confession." 

The last ordinance given as a sacrament is Extreme 
Unction, which proceeds from the same fatal error about 



188 



EXTREME UNCTION. 



good works, and which is considered the more important, 
as being only administered in cases of dangerous sick- 
ness, it is thought to wash away the remaining sins, 
which penance may have left, and open to the dying 
person the gates of lieaven, or at least of purgatory, and 
close the gates of hell. 

" There are in this sacrament three principal effects, 
says the doctrine chretienne. The first is to give 
strength to the sick against the temptations of the devil 
and against the horrors of death ; it strengthens their 
faith and confidence in God and thereby fortifies them 
against the attacks of the devil. The second effect is 
to cleanse the remains of sin and the sins themselves, 
if there are still any to he expiated. The third effect 
is to restore health to the sick, if it be necessary for 
their salvation. Two things are essential to this sacra- 
ment, the anointing with oil and the prayer, which 
accompanies it. The holy oil is applied to each of the 
principal limbs, to purify it of the sins of which it has 
been the organ or instrument. Here is the prayer 
which the priest pronounces at the same time, ' May 
the Lord, by this anointing with the sacred oil and by 
his very great mercy, forgive thee all the sins, which 
thou hast committed by the sight, the smell, and the 
other senses.' " 

The only passage of Scripture alleged in support of 
tliese i)retensions of saving the sick by means of the 



THE USE OF OIL. 



189 



Holy Oil, is to be found in the fifth chapter of the 
epistle of St. James, 14th verse. ^^Is any sick among 
you P let him call for the elders of the Church ; and 
let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the 
name of the Lord : and the prayer of faith shall save 
the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up, and if he have 
committed sins, they shall be forgiven him." Now no 
one can fairly deny that these words give direction how 
the elders should pray for the recovery of the health of 
the sick, and that the forgiveness of his sins is promised 
to the prayer of faith which shall save the sick, not to 
the oiL They are rather a confinnation of this declara- 
tion of St. Paul : " By gTace are ye saved through faith ; 
and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God : not of 
works, lest any man should boast" — (Ephesians, ii. 8.) 
They preclude the idea of attributing to a simple 
sanatory act, any tendency whatever to save the soul of 
the sick or to contribute in any way whatever to the 
remission of his sins. The oil which St. James recom- 
mends here, was used as a sign of health and vigour 
among all the Eastern nations : it was thought to give 
pliancy to the limbs, and to be a preseiTative against the 
plague, leprosy and other contagious diseases. Therefore 
this anointing with oil was a mere Jewish custom, and it 
is recommended here by St. James simply as a medicinal 
remedy : there is not the least allusion to the death of 
the sick person ; all is to be done for the restoration of 



190 



MISTAKEN MEANS OF SALVATION. 



his health. Yet Extreme Unction^ since it has grown 
into a sacrament, is considered to be efficacious only at 
the article of death ; and if the sick should recover, it is 
of no effect : so many of the common people think it 
unlucky for a person to recover after receiving the 
Extreme Unction. It was introduced even after the 
sacrament of Penance. It has sprung from the assumed 
power of remitting sins and from the belief that men by 
doing certain practices, wdiich were called good works 
could atone for the sins they had committed. Such a 
belief then must virtually set aside the atoning sacrifice 
of Christ, because if men can in any way expiate their 
sins, there was no occasion that Christ should die for 
sinners. If Christ has atoned for the sins of mankind, 
the works of Penance and Extreme Unction are useless. 
A mortification of all unruly appetites, a horror of sin 
and a newness of life are the necessary fruits of a sincere 
faith and the marks of a true repentance : but faith 
in the atonement of Christ and repentance for sins 
are our only grounds of pardon and reconciliation with 
God and the only conditions required by his word. — To 
attach a gTeater idea of solemnity to this supposed 
sacrament, the Holy Oil is consecrated only once a 
year, on Holy Thursday, the day on which the institu- 
tion of the blessed sacrament is kept. 

Milner, in "The End of Religious Controversy," 
boasts of the peace and confidence which attend members 



FALSE CONFIDENCE. 



191 



of his Churchy on their dying beds, and sa} s that not 
one Roman Catholic was ever known to wish to leave 
his Church at that awful moment. The Hindoo 
Brahmin and the Mohammedan Mollah will assert the 
same thing, probably with more truth, of all the deluded 
votaries of their false religions. It is easy to make 
such assertions, but difficult to substantiate or disprove 
them. But supposing this to be perfectly true, what 
does it prove ? It certainly is no proof that Extreme 
Unction is a divine institution, although so much virtue 
is now attributed to it ; for on the same ground it might 
be maintained that Fetichism is of God, since any one 
acquainted with Western Africa knows very well, that 
the sick negro feels himself secure against evil spirits, 
when he has put round his neck a fetiche or amulet, 
blessed by his priest. No, this only shows, that men, 
who during life, have looked up to other men, whether 
living or dead, for their salvation, and have never felt a 
deep conviction that they were exclusively to seek 
reconciliation with God through a dying Saviour and to 
trust in him as their only Intercessor and Mediator, 
continue or are induced, at the approach of death, to 
place their hope and confidence in artificial means, 
w^hich are presented to them with so high sounding pre- 
tensions and are thereby calculated to strike their 
imaginations and lull their minds into the delusive 
slumber of self-righteousness and priestly power. But 



192 



THE INDIAN FANATIC. 



security is not safety ; and a blind, thougii happy con- 
fidence is not a proof of its being well founded. The 
beniojhted Hindoo, who throws himself under the wheels 
of the Car of the Idol of Juggernaut, in order to obtain 
eternal beatitude, is full of confidence, is full of hope : 
yet who does not pity his blind credulity and deplorable 
fanaticism P 



CHAPTEE XVI. 



"For we are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit^ 
and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh." — 
Phil. iii. 3. 



I must now say a few words upon fasting and absti- 
nence, which are considered both by the Roman and 
Greek Churches, so essential to a religious life, and 
necessary to salvation. Fasting has been practised from 
the highest antiquity* All Eastern nations have been 
addicted to abstinence and fasting. Under the old law 
the Jews were enjoined to fast upon certain days, and 
their fast was most rigorous. Other fasts were also kept 
as an act of humiliation and mourning. Our Saviour 
himself did fast forty days previous to entering upon his 
ministry. We are told that the Church orders the fast 
of Lent in commemoration of this. But this fasting of 
forty days was supernatural : it was intended to announce 

N 



194 



FASTING NOT NECESSARY. 



that he came to estahlish a new law, just as Moses had 
received the law after having fasted forty days. 

Though Jesus Christ observed the law of Moses, yet 
he did not enjoin his disciples to fast, for which he was 
reproved by the disciples of John ; thereby shewing that 
the works of the law were to be abolished, and that all 
those outward signs, which had been ordered as a pre- 
paration for the reception of the light of the Gospel^ 
were to be replaced by spiritual mortification and by a 
purer dispensation. But the hour cometh and now is, 
when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in 
spirit and in truth : for the Father seeketh such to 
worship him. God is a spirit ; and they that worship 
him, must worship him in spirit and in truth" — (John iv. ) 

The first Christian converts, being Jews^ thought that 
they ought still to keep the law. We see by the epistles, 
of St. Paul, the pains he took to draw them out of this 
error, and with what energy he insists upon the works 
of the law being useless to salvation. " Wherefore, my 
brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the 
body of Christ, that you should be married to another, 
even to him, who is raised from the dead, that we should 
bring forth fruit unto God"— (Rom. vii. 4.) And in 
his epistle to the Galatians, he says : But that no man 
is justified by the law in the sight of God, it is evident : 
for the just shall live by faith. And the law is not of 
faith : but, the man that doeth those things, shall live in 



NOT COMMANDED BY CHKIST. 



195 



them." Again, to point out the error of relying upon 
any works of the iaw^, as means of advancing oar salva- 
tion and of securing God's favour, he adds: "But the 
Scripture has concluded all under sin, that the promise 
by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that 
believe. But before faith came, we were kept under the 
law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be 
revealed. Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to 
bring us unto Christ, that w^e mightbe justified by faith. 
But after that faith is come, we are no longer under a 
schoolmaster. For ye are all children of God by faith 
in Christ Jesus" — (Gal. iii.) 

We do not condemn fasting and abstinence : we only 
say that it is wrong to command them as necessary, and 
to prescribe rules for their obseiTance, w^hich we are 
told men are bound to obey under pain of incurring 
divine wrath. Moreover, as neither Christ nor his 
apostles, whose commands alone are binding upon 
Christians, did lay any rules about fasting and absti- 
nence, every one is at liberty to follow his own inclination, 
and to impose upon himself the mental or bodily 
discipline, which he considers most conducive to restrain 
the sensual appetites. Though it cannot be denied 
that Scripture sanctions fasting as one of the means to 
be used to keep the body under subjection, yet it 
carefully guards us against the tendency of attaching to 
it any idea of merit or of satisfaction. But the Church 

N 2 



196 



FASTING FIRST VOLUNTARY. 



of Rome has perverted a simple practice approved by 
Scriptm-e, as she has done so many of its doctrines, and 
has drawn from it principles thoroughly opposed to the 
spirit of the Gospel. Here is what she now teaches 
upon this point : We all have sins to atone for ; it is 
hy works of mortification that we atone for them and 
satisfy divine justice. The Church, which knows the 
need, in which we are of this remedy, and the repugnance, 
which we feel to adopt it, comes to the help of our 
weakness : she makes it an express command, in order 
to determine more efficaciously our will to submit to it. 
Jesus Christ has established the Church, to govern men 
and bring them to salvation, it is therefore a great sin 
not to observe the fasts and abstinences, which she 
prescribes.''* 

In the first ages of the Church, many men practised 
fasting and other works of mortification, which some 
carried to a lamentable and often ridiculous excess, f 
They first sought only to mortify their passions by 
adopting that course : nevertheless the history of all 

* Doctrine chretienne LXII et LXIII Lectures. 

f These severe austerities were at first particularly practised, 
and brought into repute by the early schismatics and heretics. 
When TertuUian had become a Montanist, he objected to the 
Catholics that they thought all fasts were to be kept at every man's 
liberty and will, and not by express command except the two days, 
in which Christ was taken away from them, L e. the two days before 
Easter. " Certe in Evangelio iUos dies jejuniis determinatos putant, 
in quibus ablatus est sponsus: et hos esse jam solos legitimos 
jejuniorum Christianorum." — De Jejuniis, cap. ii. 



COMMANDED AS AN ATONEMENT. 



197 



ages of the Church proves that a fiery mind and the 
pride of life could still abide in a decayed and macerated 
body. But as men are naturally prone to ascribe an 
undue importance to whatever they value or practise, it 
soon began to be believed that these mortifications 
j^ossessed merit in themselveS;, and tliat they were 
necessary to expiate sins committed against God : and 
when that belief had once crept into the Church, then 
both the Latin and Greek bishops thought fit to 
command some of these practices to the genenil body of 
Christians, as a penance for their sins, whilst they 
sanctioned and applauded others of a more rigorous 
nature in those men who were considered as the most 
adv^anced in Christian warfare, and the special favourites 
of heaven. The Church of Rome imbued with the 
spirit of ruling over men's consciences has made an 
express command of periodical fasting and abstinence, 
which were at first only voluntary acts in individuals. 
She pretends that to refuse the yoke, which she has 
imposed is a heinous sin, since it is disobeying Christ 
himself. But Scripture, which is our only safe guide 
in all things pertaining to salvation, furnishes us with a 
ready answer to such a command. 

First it teaches us that, if we are risen with Christ, we 
are to set our affection on things above, not on things 
on the earth : therefore we are to mortify our members, 
which are upon the earth, by abstaining from all 



198 CHRISTIAN LIBERTY. 

inordinate affection and evil concupiscence. But at the 
same time it orders us not to attach any importance, 
much less any idea of merit or expiation to any kind 
of maceration and humiliation of the body, or to 
any abstinence fromi meat or drink^ which may he 
commanded by men, as we see in St. Paul's epistle to 
the Colossians, ch. ii, v. 20 : " Wherefore, if ye be dead 
with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as 
though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances, 
(Touch not; taste not; handle not; which are all 
to perish with the using) ; after the doctrines and 
eommandmen ts of men ? Which things have indeed a 
shew of wisdom in tvill-nwrship'^' and humility, and 
neglecting of the body, not in any honour to the 
satisfying of the flesh." Secondly, it lays it out as a 
precise rule that " meat commendeth us not to God : for 
neither, if we eat, are we better ; neither if we eat not 
are we the worse" — (1 Cor. viii. 8.) The i4th 
chapter of St. Paul's epistle to the Romans, is very 
decisive upon that point, and ought to set the question 
at rest with any one who reads it dispassionately : " Let 
not him tliat eateth despise him that eateth not ; and 
let not him which eateth not judge him that eateth ; for 
God hath received him.. ..He that eateth, eateth to 
the Lord, for he giveth God thanks ; and he that eateth 
not, to the Lord he eateth not, and giveth God thanks. 
* ()?• '^S>rprrsf i/ion;' as it is in the approved Roman translation. 



FALSE IDEAS ABOUT FASTING. 



199 



For the kingdom of God is not meat and drink ; 
hnl righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy 
Ghost." 

But it is objected in defence of the fasts and ab- 
stinences prescribed by the Church of Rome, that days 
of fast are appointed in the prayer book of the Church 
of England, which its members ought to keep : and 
because the greatest number do not keep those fasts, 
they are considered as being ignorant of the spirit of 
true religion, by men accustomed to look upon fasting 
and abstinence, as the surest proofs of religious zeal and 
true piety. Such an objection and so false and absurd 
conclusions arise from mistaken notions concerning the 
nature of the Church and the power of the clergy, and 
from the false ideas of sanctity, which have been ascribed 
to those periodical privations of food. 

At the Reformation, when so many abuses and errors 
were cut off, fasting w^as retained, according to the 
notions of ancient discipline, as a means to mortify the 
senses and to keep the mind in due vigilance: but no 
idea of expiation or merit was attached to it. It was 
simply recommended ; it was not ordered under pain 
of sin and damnation, as it is by the Church of Rome ; 
for this would have been assuming a right, which no 
man, nor any body of men can possess. Therefore 
every one, though bound to be temperate in all things 
and to mortify his senses, with regard to abstinence and 



200 WE MUST DO ALL TO THE GLORY OF GOD. 

fasting is at liberty to follow the advice of St. Paul. 

Whatsoever is set before you, eat, asking no question 
for conscience sake. If I partake with thanksgiving, 
why am I evil spoken of for that for which I give 
thanks ? Therefore whether you eat or drink, or what- 
soever else you do ; do all to the glory of God' — 
(] Cor. X. 26.) 



CHAPTEE XVIL 



" But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy 
nation, a peculiar people ; that you should shew forth the praises of 
Him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light," 
— 1 Peter ii. 9. 



I am now brought to the last consideration — the 
Church. What is the Church ? In the original language, 
namely the Greek, in which the books of the New 
Testament were mitten, or at least were transmitted to 
us, the word used for Church is EKKAHSIA, which 
means a convocation, a general assembly summoned 
by the crier. Those then that are called out to that 
general assembly and attend to the call, are the Ecclesia, 
are the Church. Who are they that are so called ? — 
Those that are in Christ Jesus, w^ho walk not after the 
flesh, but after the spirit ; — (Rom. viii. 1,) of whom our 
Saviour says: All that the Father giveth me shall 



202 



THE CATHOLIC CHURCH. 



come to me, and him that cometh unto me I will in no 
wise cast out" — (John vi. 37.) Those who follow the 
good shepherd, who has laid down his life for his sheep 
and has said : My sheep hear my v^oice and I know 
them, and they follow me ; and I give unto them eternal 
life and they shall never perish, neither shall any man 
pluck them out of my hands" — (John x. 27.) They are 
those, whom the apostle Paul addresses in these words : 
" As many of you as have been baptized into Christ have 
put on Christ. There is neither Jew, nor Greek, there 
is neither bond, nor free, there is neither male nor 
female ; for ye are all one in Christ Jesus. And if ye be 
Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs accord- 
ing to the promise" — (Gal. iii. 26.) This is the 
UNIVERSAL CHURCH, the Church against which the 
gates of hell shall never prevail. 

But besides this universal Church, scattered throughout 
all parts of the earth, which is the Church of the living 
God, the pillar and ground of the truth, the word is 
applied to congregations of believers, living in the same 
place and assembling together for worship, as we see in 
the Acts as well as in the different epistles, and in the 
book of Revelation. 

So vSt. Paul, in his first epistle to the Corinthians, 
writes thus : " Paul, unto the Church of God, which is at 
Corinth, to them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus." In 
his epistle to the Romans, he gives the name of a Church 



PRIVATE CHURCHES. 



203 



to a separate assembly^ distinct from the rest of the 
Christians then living at Rome^ who might he said to 
form the Roman Chmxh, for he says : Greet Priscilla 
and Aquila^ my helpers in Christ Jesus, likewise the 
Church that is in their house" — (Rom. xvi. 3.) And in 
the 20th chapter of the Acts, he addresses these words 
to the elders of the Church of Ephesus : ^' Take heed 
therefore unto yourselves and to all the flock, over the 
which the Holy Ghost hath placed you overseers (or 
bishops) to feed the Church of God, which he hath 
purchased with his own blood" — (Acts xx. 28.) And 
St. John addresses his book of Revelation to the seven 
Churches, which are in Asia, that is, to the Churches of 
the seven principal cities in Asia Minor. 

All these Churches, in the first century, were inde- 
pendent of each other and seem to have had no other 
communion with one another, but that of a common 
faith, with all, as St. Paul says to the Corinthians, " that 
in every place call upon the name of Jesus Christ our 
Lord, both theirs and ours." Every Christian Church 
consisted of the people, their leaders and ministers. 
The leaders or teachers and the ministers or deacons, 
were appointed by the assembly of the people or received 
by the free consent of the latter, if they were presented 
to them by the apostles or by any one else. The 
leaders were called presbyters or elders, that is to say 
ancients, for in all free communities of antiquity, those 



204 



BISHOPS AND PRESBYTERS. 



who were appointed to administer the affairs of the 
common wealth, were originally men of a mature age. 
These presbyters were intrusted with the care of teaching 
those congregations, which they were selected to rule. 
They were also called episcopi, bishops or overseers. 
It is very certain that in many parts of the New 
Testament the words presbyter and bishop are used 
indiscriminately : but it is not clear whether in the time 
of the apostles there was one endowed with greater 
authority, that was chosen to preside over the others.* 
The apostles appear to have enjoyed the privilege of 
establishing or ordaining presbyters, and we see by the 
epistles of St. Paul, that they actually did confer that 
privilege upon others. For he says to Titus : For 
this cause left I thee in Crete, that thou shouldest set 
in order the things that are wanting, and ordain (or 
establish) elders in every city, as I have appointed thee: 
if any be blameless... For a bishop must be blameless." 
Now the words Presbyter ( or Elder) and Bishop are taken 
indifferently in this passage, to express the same office : 
therefore it appears that all the ancients were at first 
equally overseers over the Church. This is clearly 

* Antequam Diaboli instinctu Studia in religione fierent, et 
(liceretur in populis, Eyo Sum Paidi, ego Apollo, ego autem CepJice, 
com muni presbyteromm coucilio Ecclesise gubernabantur; post- 
qiiam vero unusquisque eos quos baptizaverat, suos putavit esse 
non Christi, in toto orbe decretum est, utunusde Presbvteris electus 
sui»erponcretur caeteris, ad quem omnis Ecclesise cura pertineret, et 
schismatum semina tollerentur.— ^TieroTi. in comment, ad Titum. 



THE APOSTLES WERE NOT BISHOPS. 205 

proved by the epistle of St. Paul to the Philippians^ 
which he addresses to all the saints in Christ Jesus, 
who are at Philippi, with the bishops and deacons. 
Certainly if there had been an intermediate order of 
ministers between the bishops and deacons, he could 
not have failed to mention them. But it is also 
evident from the first epistle to Timothy, that the 
bishops or presbyters were not all invested with the 
same functions, though they were all rulers ; for St. 
Paul says in the 5th chapter, 17th verse : " Let the elders 
that rule well be counted worthy of double honour, 
especially they that labour in the word and doctrine." 

We have no authentic proof from Scripture, nor 
indeed from any other source, that any of the apostles 
governed personally any particular Church, as bishops 
afterwards did. Indeed such was not the end of their 
mission. Their duty was, as they express it themselves 
in the sixth chapter of the Acts, to give themselves 
continually to prayer, and to the ministry of the word." 
While they remained in Jerusalem, they directed the 
affairs, not only of the Church at Jerusalem, but in the 
neighbouring cities and provinces : accordingly, we see 
in the ninth chapter of the Acts, that "when the 
apostles which were at Jerusalem heard that Samaria 
had received the word of God, they sent unto them 
Peter and John." But they left the government of the 
Church and the administration of the rites of worship in 



206 THEY DIRECTED THE ^'HOLE CHURCH, 



the hands of ministers approved by the people, and 
confirmed by themselves. Therefore, the apostles 
cannot be classed in the rank of bishops or overseers 
appointed to preside over a Church. They superintended 
the whole Church indiscriminately. Wherever they 
were, they preached, they established, they set in order. 
They were invested with the same power ; they acted 
and decided conjointly or singly, as they happened to 
be placed. The apostle James the Minor, to w^hom the 
province of Judea seems more particularly to have been 
assigned, was not the bishop of Jerusalem, in the sense 
in vvhich the term was afterv/ards understood. He did 
not administer the Church of Jerusalem, he left it to 
the appointed ministers. But he directed the affairs of 
all the Churches both in Jerusalem and the adjoining 
provinces, precisely as the whole of the apostles did, 
while they were still assembled there, and as every one 
of them did in the respective places and provinces which 
they visited. St. Paul does not seem to have exercised 
any government over the Churches, which he had 
founded, even when he staid with them for a considerable 
period. The functions with which he charged Timothy 
and Titus appear to have been similar to his own, to 
attend to the doctrine, to teach and correct those who 
might err, in fact, to act as apostles or the deputies of 
an apostle. But they were not bishops, permanently 
appointed to a particular place, as we see by the words 



ORIGIN OF THE OKDER OF BISHOPS. 207 



of St Paul to Timothy : As I besought thee to abide 
still at Ephesus, when T went into P»Iacedonia^ that thou 
niightest charge some that they teach no other doctrine." 
He besought him to abide still at Ephesus precisely as 
he had sent him to the Thessalonians, to whom he writes 
— And sent Timotheus, our brother, and minister of 
God, and our fellow-labourer in the gospel of Christ, to 
establish you, and to comfort you concerning your 
faith" — (1 Thess. iii 2.) Timothy and Titus were 
then invested with the power of evangelists to set things 
in order in various places ; but that power was only for 
a time : they were not stationary, as is plainly seen by 
the epistles which were written to them. 

The order of bishops arose from those elders or over- 
seers appointed in every Church, w^ho were the regular 
teachers and rulers of the congregation ; although the 
preaching of the word was not at first coniined to 
presbyters or appointed ministers, since we see in the 
eighth chapter of the Acts, that all the members of the 
Church of Jerusalem who were scattered abroad, after 
the death of Stephen, went every where preaching the 
word."^ Whether one of those elders appointed in every 

* Ut cresceret plebs et multiplicaretur, omnibus inter initia 
concessum est et evangelizare et baptizare et Scripturas in ecclesia 
explanare. Ubi autem omnia loca circumplexa est ecclesia, con- 
venticula constituta sunt, et rectores et cetera officia in ecclesiis sunt 
ordinata, ut nullus de clero auderet, qui ordinatus uon esset, prss- 
sumere officium, quod sciret non sibi creditum. — Ambros, Sive 
Hilar. Diacon. in Ephes, w. 

See Bingham's Antiquities at the word Bishop," 



208 



A BISHOP OVER ONE CHURCH. 



Church by the ajDostles, was at first raised in pre- 
eminence over the others has been much disputed. It 
has been thought that the Church of Jerusalem was the 
first which chose a president or bishop, after it had been 
deprived of the presence of the apostles, and that its 
example was gradually followed by other churches. It 
seems, however, certain thatwhenSt. John wrote the book 
of Revelations, the seven Churches of Asia to which he 
writes were presided over by a bishop or chief minister, 
whom he addresses under the appellation of AngeL- 
The bishops of towns and cities acquired very early an 
influence which extended in the neighbouring districts, 
as the number of converts increased and Churches were 
founded in the country. To these the bishop sent a 
presbyter or sometimes a country bishop, and kept the 
superintendence of them for himself: for these new 
Churches were considered only as sue cur sales or chapels 
of ease, which were affiliated to the principal Church 
and remained dependent upon it. So that these bishops 
presided over one Church only, that is to say, over the 
body of believers living in one town and its dependencies. 
For this reason we always read of bishops of such and 
such a town and never of bishops of provinces. This is 
an evident proof that all bishops were in the beginning 
only local ministers appointed to one Church, and that 

* « The order of bishops," says Turtulian, " when it is traced 
up to Its original, will be found to have St. John for one of its 
authors. — Bingham. lb. 



NO SUPREME BISHOP, 



209 



there was no supreme L>isliop of the whole Church, nor 
even of several Churches. We find still in Syria, 
among the ruins of empires and of once powerful cities^ 
some of these primitive bishops who either singly or 
attended by one or two presbyters, have the care of one 
congregation, collected in one place or disseminated in 
the adjoining district. The once proud Balbec presents 
to the eye of the astonished traveller the gigantic ruins 
of its stupendous temples ; but it has none so interest- 
ing as its poor and venerable bishop, dispensing the 
consolations of religion in his humble Church built with 
a few of the smallest remains of the mighty ruins, by 
which it is surrounded. — This accounts for the vast 
number of bishops of which we read as being found in 
the first ages of the Church in a single province of the 
Roman empire. 

The Churches vy ere at first independent of each other : 
every one of them was governed by its own laws, and its 
own leaders, and ministers, whether bishop, presbyters, 
or deacons. But as some of these Churches were in cities 
that possessed a great importance, on account of being 
the capitals of provinces, it necessarily followed that the 
Churches of those cities acquired an influence over those 
of the neighbourhood. Besides some of those principal 
cities having been much frequented by the Apostles, 
their bishops were often consulted in difficult or doubtful 
cases ; but they had no power to enact laws, which 





210 



PROVINCIAL COUNCILS. 



should bind others ; for a perfect equality subsisted 
among them all. Each Christian Church was a little 
state, ruled by its own laws, which were either enacted 
or approved by the whole community. But in process 
of time, all the Christian Churches of a province were 
formed into one large ecclesiastical body, which, like 
confederate states, sent deputies who assembled at 
certain times, in order to deliberate about the common 
interest of the whole. These assemblies were called 
synods or councils, and they first took place among the 
Greeks towards the end of the second century. The 
bishops, who were deputed to these councils, at first 
acknowledged that they were only the deputies of their 
respective Churches, that they acted in the name and 
by appointment of their people. But by degrees they 
extended their authority and claimed the right of enacting 
laws concerning faith and manners, and at last they 
began to consider themselves as being invested with the 
character, rights, and privileges of the Jewish priesthood, 
as being the lawful successors of the Apostles. Neither 
were their pretensions perfectly unfounded : for, as in 
a body of men, authority must be vested somewhere, 
and the bishops were appointed to teach and to rule, it 
was natural that they should think, that they had a 
right to enact those laws on account of their sacred office 
being delegated to them, through regular succession 
from the apostles, who either ordained or sanctioned 



GENERAL COUNCILS. 



211 



bishops^ or presbyters, and other ministers in all the 
Churches which they had founded. And as the old 
Jewish priesthood was destroyed after the taking of 
Jerusalem, the Christian ministers easily persuaded 
themselves that they were destined to succeed it and 
enjoy all its privileges in the new dispensation. 

When provincial councils had been thus regularly 
established, some bishops were chosen to preside over 
the council and to watch over the affairs of the whole 
province : the bishop of the capital city of the province 
was naturally entitled to that pre-eminence ; hence arose 
the rights of Metropolitans. 

These assemblies were not long confined to the re- 
presentatives of a single province. The Churches of 
several provinces sent their deputies, who met together 
at stated periods, or in any emergency to deliberate on 
their general interests and the discipline and doctrine 
of the Church ; and at last under Constantine, com- 
missioners from the greatest part of the Churches of the 
one hundred and twenty provinces of the Roman world 
assembled and formed those councils, which were called 
oecumenical or general. In consequence of this more 
extended intercourse, there arose a new order of digni- 
taries, who vrere considered as the heads of the Church, 
and to whose authority many provinces were assigned. 
They were known under the name of patriarchs ; and 
the most distinguished of them w^ere those of Jerusalem, 

2 



212 



PATRIARCHS. 



Kome, Ailtiocli, and Alexandria, in the Roman empire ; 
to whom may he added that of Seleucia or Bahylon., 
who was under the dominion of the Persian monarchs.* 
All these patriarchates under various changes of fortune 
have continued to this davo 

* The patriarch of Babylon, who now resides at Mosul, pretends 
to be a lineal descendant of St Peter.— See Dr. Wolfs Mission to 
Bokhara, 



CHAPTEE XVIII. 



" Call no man your father upon the earth: for one- is your 
Father, which is in heaven. Neither be ye called masters : for one 
is your master, even Christ." — Mat. xxiii. 9, 10. 



We see the Church in its development follow the 

course of all human government. First, the bishop 

presiding over a small community was one with his 

flock, was confounded with his presbyters and people , 

did every thing with their advice and consent. The 

synods having exalted the importance of bishops^ every 

thing springs from them, every thing is referred to them, 

and is done by them.^ They assume by degrees the 

* Those who maintain that the bishops are the successors of the 
apostles, as such, in contradistinction to the presbyters^ quote the 
epistles of Ignatius, who is certainly the oldest authority, that we 
can have next to the inspired writings. But it appears very evident 
that the passages, in which he is made to speak of the bishop, must 
be interpolations of subsequent ages, or else within one short gene- 
ration the whole of the doctrine of the apostles concerning the 
ministers of Chiist must have been totally subverted, for Ignatius 



214 



THE BISHOP OF ROME. 



rights and privileges of the civil power, and the prelate of 
each city exercises an influence proportioned to the 
command of the governor of the city in which he 
resides. Some of them are raised ahove their equals. 
They engross authority, influence, and dignity : they 
become superior beings. At last, one who had early 
set up high pretensions absorbs all authority in himself, 
and is gradually acknowledged by a great number of 
his brethren as the vicegerent of God, as the fountain- 
head, from which all power flows, as the sovereign 
monarch, before whom all must bend, and whom all 
must obey. 

This is the natural march of human affairs. Numbers 

will create influence, influence will generate wealth : 

wealth will give rise to pomp and display, and these will 

command obedience and diflerence. It was so with the 

bishop of Rome, It was a natural consequence of his 

position, as the bisshop of the capital of the Roman 

world, that he should be possessed of great influence at 

lioes not say that the bishop is the successor of the apostles, but 
that he is in the place of God or of Christ, and he claims for the 
presbyters the place of the apostles. So, if Ignatius is to be believed, 
we must look upon the bishop as Christ himself, and upon the 
presbyters as the apostolical body ; for he says : " Study to do 
all things under your bishop presiding in the place of God, and 
the presbyters in the place of the apostolical Senate, and the 
deacons, most dear to me, as those to whom is committed the 
ministry of Jesus Christ." Ignatius ad Magnes. Again, Omnes 
revereautur diaconos, ut mandatum Christi, et episcopum ut 
Jesum Christum, existentem Fihum Patris; Presbyteros autem ut 
(concilium Dei, Idem apiid Tral. "Let all reverence the deacons, as 
the order of Christ, and the bishop as Jesus Christ the living Son 
of the Father, also the Presbyters as the council of God." 



HIS PRE-EMINENCE ACQUIRED. 



215 



an early period. He surpassed all his brethren in the 
magnificence and splendour of the Church over which 
he presided, the richness of his revenues and the number 
of his ministers. Even the prestige of certain traditions 
which generally prevailed in the third and fourth 
centuries dazzled the minds of men, and augmented that 
veneration for the episcopal dignity which began to be 
carried beyond its proper limits. And when at last 
through a long series of circumstances favourable to his 
aggrandizement, he stood alone erect and powerful 
among the shattered remains of Roman grandeur, he 
inherited the rights to universal empire promised to the 
eternal city. 

Though he had thus early acquired a certain right of 
pre-eminence, this pre-eminence Avas long one of rank 
and not of authority. He was a wealthy and powerful 
citizen in the Christian commonwealth, but he was not 
its master and governor. The bishops considered them- 
selves as ministers of Christ, appointed by divine 
authority and not by the will and consent of the bishop 
of Rome, whose equals they were, whose opinion they 
might ask, but w^hose decisions they were not bound to 
follow. The contest between Victor the First and the 
bishops of Asia, towards the end of the second century 
and between Stephen the First, bishop of Rome, and the 
bishops of Africa, about the middle of the third century 
in which none of these bishops would submit to the 



216 



GOVERNMENT OF THE CHURCH. 



decision of the Roman prelate, shows that at those two 
periods he was not acknowledged as possessing supreme 
authority in the Church, though his power had already 
vastly increased especially in the time of Cyprian, who^ 
at the head of the African bishops, withstood the wrath 
of Stephen and treated his invectives and pretensions 
with scorn. 

When under the auspicious protection of Constantino^ 
the Christian religion had been raised to a predominant 
situation in the Roman empire, the emperor assumed a 
certain authority in the Church. He called councils, often 
presided in them, terminated the differences which arose 
between bishops and the people, or between bishops them-^ 
selves, who, since wealth and power had boon added to 
their dignity, frequently contended in the most scandalous 
manner concerning the extent of their respective juris- 
dictions. He fixed the limits of ecclesiastical provinces 
and left to bishops and councils the cognizance of causes 
purely ecclesiastical. But as the limits between these 
two divisions in the administration of affairs v/ere not 
clearly defined, there were often mutual encroachments 
on the part of the civil and ecclesiastical power. So 
Valentinian, the emperor of the West, enacted a law 
about the year 372, by which he ordered that hereafter 
the bisho]) of Rome should be empowered to judge other 
bishops, in order that religious disputes might not be 
decided by secular judges. But this decree did not 



EQUALITY OF PATRIARCHS. 



217 



extend beyond the limits of the Western emiDire ; and 
in fact it was addressed only to the bishops of Gaul and 
Italy, as the jurisdiction of Valentinian, anymore than 
that of the Roman prelate was not in force in the 
Eastern division of the empire. Some of the Western 
bishops assembled in council at Rome in the year 378, 
glad to escape the jurisdiction of the civil magistrate in 
the settlement of their affairs and disputes, approved of 
that law and recommended the execution of it to the 
emperor Gratian. This decree and the approval of it 
by the bishops indicate that the supreme jurisdiction of 
the pope is an emanation from the civil power, and 
that it was not acknowledged w^hen the Church was 
independent of the state. 

Constantine, having divided the ecclesiastical adminis- 
tration in the same manner as the civil administration 
into four great governments, had added to the three 
sees which had hitherto held the greatest pre-eminence 
from their situation in the capital cities of Rome^ 
Antioch, and Alexandria, that of Constantinople, which 
he had just made the new capital of the empire. The 
bishop of Rome, as residing in the ancient capital, was 
considered to hold the first rank. But this rank w^as 
merely one of order and not of dignity. These four 
principal bishops or patriarchs, as they were now called, 
were equal and independent of each other, and none 
possessed any authority over the Churches submitted to 



218 



THE BISHOP OF CONSTANTINOPLE. 



the others. The clearest proof of this is the frequent 
and warm disputes, which so often arose between these 
prelates concerning the provinces which each pretended 
to belong to him. 

The bishop of Constantinople, proud of the support 
of the imperial court, soon assumed the second rank, 
and contended for the first with the bishop of Rome. 
This pretension on the part of the bishop of the new 
capital evidently shows that the rank which had hitherto 
been established between the different bishops was a 
mere civil distinction, and is a proof that the bishop of 
Rome was not yet acknowledged, even at that period, 
as the rightful and undoubted head of the Church in 
quality of successor of St. Peter ; for else no other 
bishop could ever have raised claims to a title universally 
acknowledged to be vested in that prelate by divine 
right, or at least apostolical descent. 

It appears that the emperor Justinian, in the year 
533, willing to humble the patriarch of Constantinople, 
whose spiritual power began to encroach upon temporal 
affairs, wrote a letter to the Roman Pontiff, by which he 
subjected to his authority all the Churches of the East, 
as those of the West had already been placed under his 
control by the decree of Valentinian. Admitting this 
letter to be authentic, for doubts have been raised upon 
it, we gather from it the evidence that up to the time of 
Justinian the Eastern Churches had not been submitted 



UNIVERSAL BISHOP. 



219 



to the power of the pope, that he had not heen then 
regarded as the universal bishop, in consequence of any 
privilege inherent in him, and consequently that his 
claim to authority over the universal Church rests 
upon the will of a Roman emperor and not upon divine 
right. But even this transfer does not appear to have 
been effectiv^e in placing the Eastern Churches under 
the dominion of the pope : for the patriarchs of Con- 
stantinople, so far from acknowledging the bishop of 
Rome, as the imiversal bishop, to whose superiority they 
were bound to submit, assumed that title themselves soon 
after this, and therefore claimed a superiority over the 
bishop of Rome, as well as all other bishops. We see by 
the letter, which Gregory the First, called the Great, 
wrote to John, bishop of Constantinople, that, so far from 
claiming for himself an universal supremacy over the 
Church, he blamed it as a most extravagant assumption. 

You acknowledged yourself unworthy of the name of 
bishop, he said to him, and nov/ you pretend to be the 
Jirst and only bishop. I conjure you to resist those, 
who flatter you, by attributing to you that name, full 
of pride and extravagance... Assuredly, whoever claims 
to himself universal priesthood is the forerunner of 
Antichrist." 

Nevertheless, the bishops of Constantinople continued 
to keep the title of oecumenical or universal bishops, and 
maintained that their Church was not only equal in 



220 DISPUTES BETWEEN THE TWO BISHOPS. 

authority and dignity to that of Rome, but also the 
head of all the Churches. But soon after Gregory, 
Boniface III. engaged the tyrant Phocas, the murderer 
of the emperor Maurice, to check the pretensions of the 
bishop of Constantinople, by taking away from him 
that title which he claimed, and conferring it upon the 
Roman prelate. However, the patriarchs of Con^ 
stantinople did not silently acquiesce to this spoliation ; 
the disputes which had long subsisted between the two 
sees, proceeded to the most violent lengths in the course 
of the seventh century. The controversy about the 
worship of images, which the Greek emperors wished to 
abolish on account of the manifold abuses of which it 
was the cause, came to widen the breach in the next 
century : and though the image-worshippers triumphed 
at length, and the power of the monks, who were 
the strenuous supporters of that worship, was fully 
established at Constantinople, yet the efforts of the 
papal court to impose upon the Greeks the supreme 
authority and the ghostly dominion of the pope 
finally failed. After the dispute between the Greeks 
and the Latins had been carried to the greatest 
length ; after the popes and Greek patriarchs had 
loaded each other with reciprocal invectives and im- 
j)rccations, they ended by mutual excommunication, 
and the schism between the two Churches was finally 
perfected. 



SOVEREIGN PONTIFF. 



221 



Po])e Theodorus the First, who died about the 
middle of the seventh century, is said to have been the 
first bishop of Rome, who permanently assumed the 
title of Pontifex Maximus or Sovereign Pontiff, and 
the kst, whom the bishops have called hrother. The 
bishops ceased to be his brethren, that is to say his 
equals, because the pope had succeeded to all the pre- 
rogatives of the ancient heathen emperors, who always 
assumed the title of Sovereign Pontiffs, as being the 
heads of the religion as w^ell as the state. 

But it is not as the successors of the emperors only, 
that the popes claimed the supreme authority in the 
Church ; it is, as being the successors of St. Peter, who, 
they said, was the prince of the apostles, and the first 
bishop of Rome. 

It is denied by many that St. Peter ever was bishop 
of Rome on several reasons, which certainly bear the 
weight of very strong evidence in their favour. First, 
bishops were teachers appointed to instruct and super- 
intend the people of any particular Church, to which 
they remained attached ; therefore the assumption of 
such an office on the part of an apostle would have been 
contrary to the intent of his apostleship. Second, the 
apostle Paul wrote his epistle to the Romans about the 
year 57 or 58, that is, at least three years after St. Peter 

* He was son to the bishop of Jerusalem: this is a proof that the 
maiTiage of bishops and priests was not yet dishonourable in the 
serenth ceutuiy, even in the Roman Church. 



222 



ST. PETER. 



must hcive been finally settled in Rome, according to 
some chronologists who follow Eiisebiiis, who says in 
his 3rd book: ''Peter appears to have gone round 
Pontus, Galatia, &c., preaching only to the Jews, and 
at last to have stopped in Rome, where he was crucified 
with his head downwards"^ — (Eusebius, book iii. ch. 2.) 
In this epistle St. Paul makes an apology for not having 
yet gone to Rome, and says : '' I long to see you, that 

1 may impart unto you some spiritual gift, to the end 

that you may be established." Now if St. Peter had 

been at the head of the Roman Church for several years, 

could St. Paul have used that language ? Does it not 

show on the contrary that the Romans had not yet been 

visited by an apostle, and that the light of faith which 

they had received, had been imparted to them by private 

brethren and inferior ministers ? Moreover at the end 

of his letter, he salutes many persons by name but he 

makes no mention of Peter, whom it cannot be expected 

that he should have omitted, had he known him to be in 

Rome. At last he went to Rome, from whence he wrote 

several letters, and in none of these epistles does he 

* Some chronologists who lay claim to a wonderful accuracy, 
though they have not one shadow of authentic document to work 
upon, pretend that Peter governed the Church of Kome 25 years, 

2 months and 7 days ; while others who are equally accurate, say 
that he governed it 24 years, 5 months, and 10 days. But this 
vulgar tradition of Peter's 25 years of episcopacy which even has 
passed into a proverb, can easily be disproved by the Acts of the 
Apostles and the epistle of St. Paul to the Galatians, and is no 
more entitled to credit than the numberless legendaiy traditions 
which are believed, because they have been written. 



SILENCE OF ST. PAUL, 



223 



make allusion to Peter or to his ministry in that city. 
In his second epistle to Timothy, which he wrote just 
before his martyrdom, he says that at his first answer all 
forsook him. Though he names again several persons, 
he makes no allusion to Peter. Is it at all likely that 
he w^ould have been silent about so eminent a member 
of the Church, had he known him to have planted the 
Church of Rome and to have sulFered martyrdom there 
before him, or to be there at the time either as the head 
of the Church or even as his fellow prisoner ? It is the 
current belief that Peter and Paul suffered martyrdom 
the same day, though Eusebius does not say so ; this 
tradition seems to be posterior to his time. He indeed 
relates that, according to Origen, Peter was crucified at 
Rome, and that Paul was martyred under Nero, but he 
does seem to imply that they were put to death together. 
Prudentius and Augustine say, that St. Paul had his 
head cut off, on the 24th of June, (in the year 67) one 
year after the death of St. Peter. 

There is nothing but oral tradition in support of 
the assertion that Peter was bishop of Rome, or even 
that he ever was at Rome at any time. These 
traditions, it is true, were afterwards written. But 
the early historians, Epiphanius and Eusebius him- 
self, upon whose authority St. Peter's presence in Rome 
chiefly rests, are allowed, even by Roman Catholic 
writers to have been too credulous, and their works 



224 



PABULOUS LEGEND. 



are said to be full of fabulous legends and false 
assertions : yet they only related what was currently 
believed, and generally received in their days. Besides^ 
they did not write till about the middle of the fourth 
century. 

We know that the pretended lives of the apostles, 
which we now have, are full of fables. We are not to 
be surprised at this, since even spurious lives of Christ 
were written in the early days of the Church, and partly 
believed: for many passages, taken from apocryphal 
gospels are quoted by some of the earliest fathers, as 
if they were taken from the true gospels, in which they 
are no where to be found. 

The very occurrence which is said to have been the 
cause why St. Peter was put in prison, and afterwards 
sentenced to death by Nero, is an evident fable ; all 
judicious writers even among Roman Catholics admit it 
to be such. It is said that Simon Magus, whom St. 
Peter had formerly confounded in Samaria, and after- 
wards at Rome, pretended to be endowed with the 
power of flying, and by art magic mounted up in 
the air in the presence of the emperor : but St. Peter 
kneeling down to pray, (some accounts say that St. 
Paul was also present, and prayed with him) the 
magician's wings became entangled, he fell down, broke 
his legs, and died miserably. This enraged so much the 
emperor Nero, who was fond of the magician, that he 



Peter's presence in rome. 



225 



flung the apostle into prison^ and St. Paul with him."^ 
Some accounts tell us that at the pressing instances of 
the Christians, and by favour of the guards Peter 
escaped from prison, and going out of the city met 
Jesus Christ entering in by the same gate, to whom he 
said, Lord, whether art thou going ?" and upon our 
Saviour answering, "To Rome, to be crucified again," 
comprehending the meaning of these words, he im- 
mediately returned back to the prison and prepared 
himself for death. 

These stories so contrary to the spirit of the gospel, 
which savour so much of the fabulous legends to be 
found among all barbarous nations, are related upon 
the faith of an Ambrose and other men, who have been 
eminent in the Church, which their leaning to mar- 
vellous stories, and their constant seeking after false and 

* According to Eusebius it was under Claudius on Ms coming 
to Rome for the first time, that Peter encountered the Magician, that 
is, between 15 and 20 years before the time, which later tradition has 
assigned to this event, which it has embellished with marvellous 
circumstances, as is invariably the case with traditionary legend. 
Eusebius merely says, that "Simon Magus, having foimerly been 
confounded in Judeaby the Apostle Peter, went to Rome and relying 
upon the demon, v hich he kept near him Cwhich is called by the 
Greeks Paredros, i. e. assistant^ he acquu'ed in a short time so 
much repute by his sorceries, that the P*.omans erected a statue in 
his honour as to a God. But in the time of Claudius, divine provi- 
dence brought to the city of Rome, Peter, the chief of the apostles 
hy greatness of faith and merit of virtue ; and with the word of 
wholesome preaching, he was the m*st who opened the gate of the 
heavenly kingdom with the keys of his gospel in the city of Rome, 
The hght of the word of God having thus shone out in Rome, the 
darkness of Simon was put out, together ^dth him who was the 
author of it." So according to this story of Eusebius, Simon must 
have died in the time of Claudius. — Euseb* Book ii. ch. xiv. 



P 



226 DOUBTFUL IF HE EVER WAS THERE. 



extravagant excitements have so much tended to corrupts 
Yet these are the men, whom we are to take for our 
models in all things, these are the guides that we are 
exckisively to follow ! Whatever they have said, 
whatever they have done, whatever they have believed, 
however opposed it may be to the truth of the gospel, we 
are bound to receive it under pain of being set down 
as presumptuous rebels, who reject the authority of the 
lawful pastors, whom Christ has set over us to be our 
guides, to lead us to his pastures, and to feed us with 
the word of eternal life ! 

Those who maintain that St. Peter really resided at 
Rome, and was crucified there, say that he wrote his 
letters from that city ; and the proof they give is that 
he says at the end of the first epistle: ^^The Church, 
that is at Babylon, saluteth you." Now, if he really 
was at Rome, why should he not have said : " The 
Church of Rome saluteth you"? St. Paul dates from 
Rome all the epistles, which he wrote in that city, he does 
not call it, Babylon. But it is said St. Peter in that 
epistle calls Rome, Babylon figuratively. Is it meant 
then that, because these words of the apocalypse, 
''Mystery, Babylon the great, the mother of harlots 
and abominations of the earth," are supposed to apply 
to Rome, St. Peter wished to allude to the same subject, 
and point at the corruptions, which the Church of Rome 
was to foster in her bosom ? The fact is that it can 



HE NEVER WAS BISHOP OF ROME. 227 

probably never be fully proved whether he was at Rome 
or not. It will ever be asserted and credulously be- 
lieved by many, denied by others, and doubted by all 
impartial men. One thing is certain, that if he ever 
was there, it could only be for a short time as an 
apostle and not as the bishop of that city,* for Ireneeus 
in enumerating the bishops of Rome, up to his time, 
(as quoted by Eusebius,) does not mention Peter, but 
says that Linus was ordained the first bishop of Rome 
immediately by the apostles upon the first foundation 
of the Church. Fundantes et instruentes beati apostoli 
ecclesiam Lino episcopatum administrandae ecclesiae 
tradiderunt — {Euseb, Lib. v, c, vi.) And Eusebius says 
elsewhere, in speaking of the followers of the apostles, 
who assumed the government of the Churches founded 
by the apostles ; " they write that Crescens one of Paul's 
companions passed into Gaul and Linus and Clemens 
remained at Rome to govern the Roman Church" — 
{Euseb. Book in. c. iv.) But in no part of his history 
does he allude to Peter having personally governed the 
Church of Rome, or any other Church. 

But it is of little consequence whether St. Peter was 
the first bishop of Rome, and Gregory XVI, the 
present pope is his lawful successor in that see. We 
have the consenting agreement of all the early Churches 

* Dr. Lardner and other modem critics have thought that Peter 
did not go to Rome till after St. Paul's first captivity. 

p 2 



2^8 PETER, NOT THE HEAD OF THE CHURCH. 

to shew that they were independent communities, not 
acknowledging any superior, but Jesus Christ, who is 
the head of the body, the Church — (Col. i.) Whoever 
will read dispassionately those passages of Scripture 
upon which the bishops of Rome found their claims, as 
well as the language of St. Paul, in speaking of St. 
Peter, must feel convinced that Peter was not the rock 
upon which the Church was to be built, in the sense of 
having a successor who was to be the head of the 
Church, and that his authority was not greater than 
that of any other apostle. 

In the 16th chapter of St. Matthew's gospel, Jesus 
says to his disciples, But whom say ye that I am ? 
x\nd Simon Peter answered and said. Thou art the 
Christ, the Son of the living God. And Jesus answered 
and said unto him. Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-jona : 
for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but 
my Father which is in heaven. Audi I say unto thee. 
Thou art Peter, and upon this rock (petra) I will build 
my Church : and the gates of hell shall not prevail 
against it. And I will give unto thee the keys of the 
kingdom of heaven, and whatsoever thou shalt bind on 
earth, shall be bound in heaven, and w^hatsoever thou 
shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven." In 
answer to the question of Jesus Christ, Whom say 
ye that I am P Simon Peter, in behalf of the other 
apostles, said: Thou art Christ, the son of the living 



THE ROCP:, faith in CHRIST. 



229 



God. Then Jesus said to him that the confession 
which he had just made was not dictated to him by 
human knowledge, hut by the Spirit of God, whose will 
is that every one which seeth the Son and believeth on 
him, may have everlasting life. Therefore, upon this 
rock, upon the faith in Christ, he would build his 
Church, which being supported and strengthened by the 
grace of God, can never be shaken in its lively hope of 
a glorious resurrection, and of eternal salvation by the 
resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead ; but will be 
kept unto obedience by the power of God through faith 
in the sprinkling of the blood of Jesus, and wait to the 
end for the grace that is to be brought unto it at his 
revelation. 

The holding of the keys, as I have Jilready said, is 
the dispensing of the word of God. Peter and the other 
apostles, and all who preached the gospel, were to 
announce salvation through fiiith in Christ to those who 
believed, and damnation to those who did not believe 
and disobeyed the gospel. But they had no power in 
themselves, it was only in the words which they spoke ; 
for Christ says, " It is not ye that speak ; hut the spirit 
of your Father, which speaketh in you" — (Mat. x. 20.) 
Since Peter and the apostles were the special messen- 
gers chosen by God to preach Christ cruciiied, to call 
men to repentance and to faith, they were the founders, 
they were the builders of the Church. As ^te Peter 



230 PETER, THE FOUNDER OF THE CHURCH. 

had been the first apostle who preached to the Jews on 
the day of Pentecost, so afterwards he w^as also the first 
who preached to the Gentiles hi the house of Cornelius 
at Caesarea : in this manner were the words of our Lord 
literally fulfilled in him ; for by being the first person 
who explained the Gospel both to Jews and Gentiles 
after the ascension of our Saviour, he, as it were, opened 
the doors of heaven to all mankind. Thus through him, 
through his preaching, they that were sometimes far ofiT 
were made nigh by the blood of Christ, and were built 
up upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, 
Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone. 

So whatever way we interpret these w^ords of our Lord 
" Thou art Peter, and upon this rock 1 will build my 
church," we see that there is no primacy, no superiority 
assigned to Peter. Still less is there any thing to 
wari'ant the assertion that Peter was to have a special 
successor, who, throughout all the ages of the Church 
should be the head of that Church, with whom all 
Christians should be bound to be in communion or rather 
whom they should be bound to obey, as Christ's lawful 
successor and his vicar upon earth, in order to secure 
their salvation. Does not such a preposterous assump- 
tion do away virtually with the faith in Christ, to which 
alone salvation is promised in the Gospel, and invest 
Peter or rather his pretended successor with all the 
])roroi2:ativesand merits of a Redeemer, since we are told 



DISPUTE AMONG THE APOSTLES. 



231 



that faith in Christ and obedience to God's command- 
ments will not avail us any thing, unless we acknowledge 
the pope as our master and believe and practise what- 
ever he chooses to command, however contrary it may 
appear to us to the revealed word of God ? 

St. Mark, who, it is said, wrote his gospel under St. 
Peter's dictation, does not mention at all these words of 
our Saviour recorded by St. Matthew, in answer to Peter's 
declaration, " Thou art the Christ." His silence must 
be a proof, that he, or St. Peter (if St. Mark had his 
information from him, as it is supposed), did not consider 
them of vital importance ; which they would have been, if 
salvation had depended upon acknowledging Peter or his 
successor as the head of the Church. It is very certain 
that the apostles, who heard these words, did not 
understand that Peter was to be the head of the Church ; 
for a year after that, they disputed among themselves 
who should be the greatest. But Christ rebuked them 
for this, and told them that his Church would not be as 
a kingdom of this world, where they which are 
accounted to rule over the Gentiles, exercise lordship 
over them, " But whosoever," he said, will be great 
among you, shall be your minister : and whosoever of 
you will be the chiefest, shall be the servant of all." 

The words Feed my lambs," " Feed my sheep," 
which are so much insisted upon by the followers of the 
pope in vindication of his supremacy, are just such as 



232 



PETER REBUKED BY CHRIST. 



it might naturally be expected that our Saviour would 
liave used with any of the apostles or with any one else, 
whom he sent to preach the Gospel. They were 
addressed upon this particular occasion after our Lord's 
resurrection to Peter alone, because he had, as it were, 
fallen off from his office of an apostle by denying his 
divine master three times, and Jesus wished to wash 
away the ignominy of these denials by the three 
confessions of Peter : Lord, thou knowest that I 
love thee." 

We see by the narrative of the gospels that Peter 
showed more uncertainty, and more presumption than 
any of the apostles. Just after Jesus had made this 
declaration, " I will give thee the keys of the kingdom 
of heaven/' &c., he told his disciples that he must go to 
Jerusalem, and be killed, and be raised again the third 
day. Then Peter took him and began to rebuke him, 
" Be it far from thee. Lord : this shall not be done unto 
thee." Jesus, as if he had been pronouncing in 
prophetic accents the prevarication of him, who was to 
seat himself in the chair of Peter, turned and said to 
Peter, " Get thee behind me, Satan : thou art an 
offence unto me : for thou savourest not the things that 
be of God, but those that be of men'' — (Matt. xvi. 23.) 

Peter, after the Saviour's resurrection, nobly redeemed 
his faults by showing himself a zealous disciple of his 
divine master and an intrepid preacher of the gospeL 



NO MASTER BUT CHRIST. 



233 



Bat we do not see that he did claim or did possess any 
authority over the other apostles. He was one of the 
pillars of the new edifice, hut not the corner stone. The 
apostles directed jointly the spreading of the Gospel 
and ordered Peter, as any other. They heard that the 
city of Samaria had received the Gospel from Philip, 
they deputed Peter and John to preach there. Now 
this happened five years after, as it is said, Peter had 
heen presiding. If Peter had been invested with power 
and authority over them, how could they have com- 
manded him ? Would they not rather have obeyed 
him ? No, they acknowledged no head, no chief over 
them. They obeyed the precepts of their divine master, 
who had said to them : "Be not ye called Rabbi ; for 
one is your Master, even Christ; and ye are all 
brethren" — (Mat. xxiii. 8.) It was reserved to the 
worldly pretended successor of Peter to infringe this 
order and to assume the title of Holy Father, in spite 
of this injunction of Jesus Christ to his apostles : " Call 
no man your father upon earth : for one is your Father, 
which is in heaven." 

Again, Peter was accused for going in to the Gentiles : 
he was obliged to defend himself before the assembly 
of the apostles and brethren. Whenever St. Paul speaks 
of St. Peter in his epistles, he puts himself on a perfect 
equality with him, as in the second epistle to the 
Corinthians, chap xi., in which he says: " For I sup- 



234 



EQUALITY OF THE APOSTLES. 



pose I was not a whit behind the very chiefest apostles." 
Mind, he does not put himself on a par with the chief, 
but with the chiefs of the apostles. We see by this 
expression that St. Paul knew that all the apostles, were 
perfectly equal in rank and order, though some might 
enjoy a greater personal consideration than the rest, on 
account of their particular merit, and the influence they 
exercised in the Church. 

In the second chapter of the epistle to the Galatians 
St. Paul shows still more plainly the perfect equality 
which subsisted between the apostles. He alludes to a 
conference, in which he had evidently discussed with the 
apostles and their disciples the line of conduct to be 
adopted with regard to the Gentiles. He says that he 
did not give way by subjection, no, not for an hour, and 
that of those who seemed to be somewhat, whatsoever 
they were, it made no matter to him, for God accepteth 
no man's person. He makes a clear allusion to those 
of the apostles who possessed most influence in the 
Church, that is to say among the body of believers, for 
they were the Church ; and among these he names, not 
only one, but thi^ee. "And when James, Cephas, and 
John, ivho seemed to he pillars, perceived the grace, 
that was given unto me, they gave me and Barnabas the 
right hand of fellowship, that we should go unto the 
heathen and they unto the circumcision." Further, so 
far from acknowledging any superiority, any supremacy 
in Peler, who was therefore to be treated with deference 



EQUALITY OF BISHOPS. 



235 



and submission as his holiness, the pope is now treated 
by his cardinals and bishops, he adds : But when Peter 
was come to Antioch, I withstood him to the face, 
because he was to be blamed." 

In the first ages of the Church, all the bishops con- 
sidered themselves to be perfectly equal, and did not 
think that Peter was clothed with greater power than 
the other apostles, ''All the apostles were such as 
Peter, clothed with the same honour and the same 
power," says St. Cyprian. Gregory Nazianzen says, 
''Cephas is called Peter, because the Church is founded 
on the verity of the faith which he confessed, and that 
it was he who first made the confession." " If it is said, 
remarks Jerome," that the Church is founded on Peter, 
the same thing is quite as much said of the other 
apostles." Chrysostom expounds thus the words of 
Jesus Christ : " I will build my Church upon this 
rock, that is, upon this faith and confession." Likewise 
St Augustine, "Upon this rock which thou hast con- 
fessed, upon this rock which thou hast known, saying, 
'Thou art Christ, the Son of the living God,' will I 
build my Church, that is, ' I will build my Church upon 
myself, who am the Son of the living God ; I will not 
build myself upon thee, but I will build thee upon me." 

But we have no better proof that Peter is not the 
rock, upon which the Church is built, than the words of 
Peter himself. In his first epistle, so far from asserting 



236 



Peter's own words. 



that it is he and his successor, upon whom the Church 
shall stand for ever, he \eaches and strenuously enforces 
that " Other foundation can no man lay, than that is laid, 
which is Jesus Christ." He instructs us that it is hj 
faith alone that we are built upon Christ ; that no man 
can stand between us and Christ, and that it is only 
through our love of him that we shall receive the end 
of our faith, even the salvation of our souls. ''If ye 
call upon the Father, who without respect of persons 
judgeth according to every man's work, pass the time of 
your sojourning with fear : for as much as ye know that 
ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver 
and gold, from your vain conversation, received by 
tradition from your fathers ; but with the precious 
blood of Christ, as of a Lam_b without blemish and 
without spot — to whom coming as unto a living stone, 
disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God and 
precious, ye also as lively stones, are built up a spiritual 
house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, 
acceptable to God by Jesus Christ." 

And in his exhortation to the elders does he allude 
at all to the supreme power having been committed to 
]iim in the universal Church ? Does he tell them that 
they are to obey him ? Does he claim the title of 
Christ's lawful successor, which the bishop of Rome 
has assumed ? No : he does not put himself in any 
way above them ; he merely calls himself an elder as 



THE pope's supremacy. 



237 



being only one of them, saying : The elders, which are 
among you I exhort, who am also an elder, and a 
witness of the sufferings of Christ, and also a partaker 
of the glory that shall he revealed." He tells them 
that they are to feed the flock of God which is among 
them, and take care of it not by constraint, hut willingly, 
not for filthy lucre's sake, but of a ready mind. He 
admonishes them not to set themselves as lords over 
God's heritage, that is to s^y the Church or the whole 
body of believers, and not the clergy, as it is translated 
in the Roman version of the New Testament ; for they 
must have been the clergy themselves, since they were 
the rulers of the Churches, to which Peter addressed 
himself. 

The assumption of supreme authority by the popes 
was the natural result of the march of human affairs. 
They held the first rank in the Church of the capital of 
the world, at least of that part of the world, where 
Christianity had taken its birth and flourished. They 
soon acquired power, splendour, and opulence. The 
belief that they sat in the chair of St. Peter, whether 
well-founded or not, added to the prestige which 
surrounded them. They began at an early period to 
interpret in the literal sense, the power of the keys, as 
given to themselves. Though they were first rebuked 

* The Greek word means patrimony, lot, dividing by lot. 
Christian ministers were afterwards called cierus or clergy, because 
in the first ages of the Church, bishops and presbyters were chosen 
by lot or the general suffrages of every Church, 



238 



ENCROACHMENT OF PO^VER. 



for assuming an authority, which every bisho]) equally 
claimed, the constant assertion of their pretensions, and 
the force of circumstances, established as an undoubted 
right that which had only been the gradual encroachment 
of illegitimate power. Let us suppose for a moment 
that these words of Jesus Christ, I will give to thee 
the keys of the kingdom of heaven/' which most clearly 
refer to the preaching of the Gospel, were meant to 
make Peter and his successors autocrats in the Christian 
republic. Then their vvill alone ought to be a law in 
every thing which is to be determined : and those who 
acknowledge the pope as infallible, as absolute in the 
Church, are the only consistent men. But it is well 
known that the Gallcian Church and many others, never 
acknowledged that claim of the pope to absolute 
dominion and to infallibility. They maintained that the 
councils were above the pope, and that his decisions 
were of no weight, unless they were conformable to the 
decrees of councils. The Council of Trent left the 
matter undecided. Now in spite of the pertinacity of 
the popes and the constant efforts of the ultramontane 
party, the power of the keys, the divine authority is still 
placed by a vast portion of the pope's followers in the 
general councils. Thus they virtually do away with 
the very words upon which the pope's supremacy has 
been founded. 

But who gave that supreme authority to the councils 
and took it away from Peter ? It was Constantine^ 



POWER OF COUNCILS. 



239 



who assembled the first Council of Nice, and who really 
was the head of the Church, in all tenijioral matters, as 
his successors continued to be, at leasts till some time 
after the invasion of the barbarians had wrested Italy 
from the emperors, and had enabled the popes to 
become the supreme magistrates within the walls of the 
ancient capital. Here is the declaration of Constantine, 
upon which councils have founded their claims to infal- 
libility, and which is printed before the bull of induction 
of the Council of Trent. Constantinus Augustus ad 
Ecclesias. — Quidquid in Sanctis episcoporum conciliis 
decernitur, id universum Dlvince volitntati debet 
attribui." Whatsoever is decreed in the holy councils 
of bishops must all be attributed to the Divine will. 
Now if in that time it had been generally acknowledged 
that these words of Christ to Peter — " I will give unto 
thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and what- 
soever thou shalt bind upon earth, shall be bound also 
in heaven," applied to the bishop of Rome, could 
Constantine have thought of investing single bishops, 
though assembled in a body, with a right to which they 
had no individual claim^ and which was the inalienable 
prerogative of Peter's successor. The very words of the 
address Ad Ecclesias" show that Constantine acknow- 
ledged the independence of the various Churches, such 
as they existed then. This is further corroborated by 
the decision of the Council of Nice which decreed that 
the metropolitan bishop of Alexandria should have the 



240 



FACTIONS IN COUNCILS. 



same care of the Churches of Egypt as the hishop of 
Ptome had of those helonging to Rome, that is to say, 
those which were withiii the jurisdiction of the Roman 
prefect.* 

But what were those famous councils, which pretended 
to he the expounders of the Divine will ? Did unanimity 
prevail in them P Were they not torn hy factions ? 
Were they not the scene of intrigues and cahals ? Many 
of their most important decisions were carried hy a hare 
majority of a few votes and vv^ere the result of a com- 
promise or of a still baser transaction. Very often the 
holy Fathers, the heads of the militant Church met in 
councils as in two hostile camps, brandished the weapons 
of discord and launched against each other the most 
opprobrious epithets. So far from appearing guided by 
the spirit of peace and the spirit of truth, envy, jealousy, 
hatred, and distrust, were seen to rankle in their breasts. 
Such is the melancholy picture which the history of 
nearly all the general councils presents to us. Thoogh 
of course they often did much good and gave most im- 
portant and valuable decisions, they were nothing Piiore 
than political assemblies, subject to all the fluctuating 
passions wdiich agitate large bodies of men under the 
influence of public excitement and private interest. 

* See the Ecclesiastical History of Rufiniis, ch. vi. Statute 6. 
These Statutes of the Council of Nice are an undeniable proof 
thai the pope's pretensions to be the supreme head by divine right 
were not yet known, and that he was on a perfectly equal footing 
with other Metropolitans, whose iurisdictioii was entirely adminis^ 
Irative and not rehgious. 



CHAPTEE XIX. 



We know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an 
understanding, that we may know him that is true, and we are 
in him that is true, even in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true 
God, and eternal life* Little children, keep yourselves from idols^" 
1 John v. 20. 



I have now laid before you the principal reasons which 
have induced me to cease remaining a member of the 
Church of Rome, and which have made me consider 
it my duty to God and to yourselves to take you to a 
Church, which has cut off those abuses, and rejected 
those errors, which the ignorance of ages, the misinter- 
pretation of God's holy word, the blind enthusiasm of 
a misguided multitude, the ambition of rulers, joined to 
the arts of interested men, and the natural tendency of 
the human mind to seek excitement from external 
objects had introduced among those who had first been 
taught to look upon Christ as their only Redeemer, 

Q 



242 



GRADUAL GROWTH OF ABUSES. 



who by one offering perfected for ever them that are sancti- 
fied, and as the only Mediator and Intercessor between 
God and man. I have showed yon how early those super- 
stitious practices of w^orshipping men and of honouring 
relics, as if they had been endowed with a supernatural 
virtue, were added to the pure simplicity of the Gospel, 
as handed down to us by the apostles and their im- 
mediate disciples. Many of those practices and of the 
opinions to which they gave rise were gradual and as it 
were imperceptible. Being first admitted in certain 
localities, they were by degrees introduced into others, 
and at length they were generally received, after the public 
mind by departing more and more from Scripture, had 
become favourable to their reception. Such was, for 
instance, the use of images. Epiphanius says, that it 
is a highly criminal thing to introduce images into 
Christian Churches, even the image of Christ. These 
words shew us that in the latter part of the fourth 
century, when Epiphanius lived, images w^ere not in 
general use, but that it had already been attempted to 
introduce them in some Churches. 

Ceremonies multiplied in the same way. Some 
Churches finding the mode of worship of the primitive 
Christians too plain and too unattractive, admitted some 
ceremonies, w^iich gradually spread and increased, till 
at last they were carried to the utmost extravagance. 
Hence arose that mixture of Jewish and Pagan rites, to 



JEWISH AND PAGAN KITES. 



243 



each of which fanciful and emblematic signiiicatioiis 
were assioned. The invasion of the barbarians con- 
tributed much to the extension of pomp and splendid 
ceremonies. These were found the most efficacious 
means of winning over those rude and untutored minds. 
In all times and countries, austere and solemn counten- 
ances, imposing apparel, brilliant atth'e and public 
processions, have always exercised a great influence over 
the multitude. The Christian priesthood were not slow 
in discovering the immense advantages which these 
adventitious helps would give them ; so they adopted the 
dress and imitated the ceremonies of the Jewish and 
heathen priests. The bishops having succeeded to the 
prerogatives of the Roman augurs assumed their mitre 
and their crosier; and costly dresses and showy 
display became the necessary appendages of Christian 
worship. 

Relics were first kept as a remembrance^ the tombs 
of martyrs were first frequented by a pure sentiment of 
respect and love ; yet they were soon turned to abuse. 
The people assembled around those tombs ; they kept 
their feasts of charity, and occasionally partook of the 
Lord's supper over them. In the excitement, which 
such meetings naturally occasioned, the nervous system 
of the most susceptible individuals experienced violent 
emotions, v/hich occasionally wrought a change in their 
constitutions. This was noised abroad ; the most 

Q 2 



244 



TOMBS CONVERTED INTO ALTARS. 



trifiing influence was magnified and public report, as it 
always occurs, represented those cures under the most 
exaggerated colours. Multitudes flocked to that universal 
specific, worked up to the highest pitch of expectation; 
some men were found willing to profit by the general 
credulity, and men at last became the dupes of others 
or of themselves. Oratories and temples were built 
over those tombs, which were renowned for being the 
special abode of supernatural influence : and when the 
idea of oflfering again a sacrifice to God by the hands of 
a priest had begun to creep into the Church, the tombs 
were converted into altars, and in imitation of these, the 
new altars, upon which the priests pretended to renew- 
daily the sacrifice of our Saviour, were all erected in the 
forni of a tomb. Thence arose the custom of dedicating 
every Church to some saint, under whose special 
protection it was placed, either on account of his bones 
being supposed to have been buried under it, or on 
account of some part of his body or wearing apparel 
being contained as a relic on the altar erected in his 
honour. 

So the Christian temples or chapels were, in their 
turn, hung with numerous ex voto, as the temples of 
Esculapius and Diana had been, for cures performed in 
the body or limbs of the votaries. We read in the life 
of Hippocrates, that wishing to make himself acquainted 
with all the diseases incident to the human body, he 



DEVOTIONS AT THE SHRINES OF SAINTS. 245 

carefully copied the name and description of all the 
diseases which had been cured in the temple of Diana 
at Ephesus, a record of which was faithfully kept in the 
archives of the temple. All these pretended cures were 
implicitly believed, and no one, who is acquainted with 
the influence of the nervous system over the human 
frame, will venture to assert, that they were all fictitious. 
The same delusion has continued to this day. Crutches 
and other mementos are to be seen in the chapels, where 
the relics of any saint known for performing cures are 
kept, especially in those which are consecrated to the 
Virgin Mary. The devotees crawl on their knees, if they 
are very hopeful and pious, or simply walk up to the 
altar, upon which the relics are placed. If they can, 
they clasp the statue of the saint in their arms, or rub 
their sore limbs upon it ; then they go so many times 
round the statue which frequently stands on a pedestal 
separate from the wall for that purpose ; I hav^e seen it 
done, and when I was a boy, I was once made to take 
a part in the ceremony, though I cannot say that a 
miracle was ever performed upon me, because the cure 
was already accomplished, when I was taken there. 
But I did like others, I passed and re-passed my hand, 
which had been seriously wounded, over the venerable 
feet of the saint, after mass had been celebrated at his 
altar by a priest whom our party paid for that 
purpose, and went very devoutly and submissively 



246 



KOMANISM IN ENGLAND. 



through all the other particulars, which were prescribed 
to me. 

In England, there are no relics, statues, or images, 
publicly resorted to as in the countries where Romanism 
prevails ; but there is hardly any genuine devotee of the 
good old stock, not tainted with bible or protestant 
notions, who does not keep or carry some consecrated 
crucifix, medal or scapulary, to which very special 
graces are attached. 

Many of the grossest superstitions of former ages 
have certainly been cut off; for the Roman Church, 
imchangeable as it pretends to be, is marching on, 
though sometimes with retrograde steps, as well as the 
rest of mankind : but the principle is still the same. It 
is allowed by every one, that these abuses crept into the 
Church, and that they were early mixed with the 
worship of God and the invocation of Christ as Mediator 
and Intercessor. The only difference is, that those who 
take the word of God for their guide, reject them as an 
offence to God and an infraction of his positive com- 
mandments ; whereas those who retain them, cherish 
them, only because they have been practised and 
fostered by men, whom their position j)articularly 
exposed to admit and encourage such dangerous 
superstitions. 

All the writers, perhaps, of the third and fourth 
(•enturios were tainted with creature worship, because 



THE CHURCH IN THE FOURTH CENTURY. 247 

the enthusiasm for holy and austere men, whether 
living or dead, was the characteristic feature, the leading- 
idea of that period. So whatever those pious ascetics 
had touched, the very straw upon which they had lain 
was become possessed of a supernatural virtue in the 
mind of many men and still more of women, whose 
feelings, when not properly directed and enlightened by 
the pure word of the Gospel, have tended so much at 
all periods to promote superstition and give importance 
to frivolous nonentities. This fact alone sufficiently 
shows the absurdity ofrecumng to the Fathers of those 
times for an authority of the purity of the Church and 
of its doctrines. 

In the fourth century the priests had obtained power 
and were possessed of a great influence over their flocks, 
but the lives of many had become corrupt, as we see 
by the testimony of Augustine, Gregory Nazianzen, 
Jerome, and others, who inveigh bitterly against the 
change. The veneration for relics and saints was 
carried to a great excess by many ; in fact, in those 
times of divisions and disputes, it had, as it were, become 
the standard of orthodoxy. Ambrose, whose priestly 
influence even with emperors is so much admired by 
some clergymen of the Church of England, who look 
upon the Church which he governed as the heau ideal 
of a Christian Church, had warm disputes with the 
ArianSj whom the imperial court, then residing at Milan, 



248 



PRETENDED MIRACLES. 



of which he was the bishop, favoured. To silence his 
opponents, and convict them of error, he produced men 
possessed with devils, who, upon the approach of the 
relics of Gervasius and Protasius, acknowledged with 
loud cries that the doctrine of the council of Nice con- 
cerning the three persons of the Godhead was true, and 
that of the Arians not only false, hut of the most 
dangerous consequence. The Arians of course laughed 
at the prodigy, and accused Ambrose of having suborned 
these infernal witnesses by a bribe ; though, with more 
charity, we may venture to say that they abused the 
credulity of the times in order, to impose upon the 
multitude and gratify the wishes of Ambrose, who 
probably was the dupe of their imposture, as well as 
the rest of his party. 

Sulpicius Severus relates that, after the famous 
Martin of Tours had left a certain place, where he had 
spent the night, the holy virgins, who had been 
honoured with his visit, threw themselves upon the 
straw, on which he had slept, and divided it among 
themselves as a most precious treasure, and some of 
them scraped even the earth, over which the straw had 
been spread. He adds that some days after, one of 
them having suspended that part of the straw, which 
had fallen to her share, to the neck of a demoniac, the 
evil spirit immediately departed from the man with 
great cries. 



SUPERSTITIOUS CREDULITY. 



249 



St. Augustine says, that the dust brought from 
Palestine was very potent to cure both mental and 
bodily diseases ; and it is well known what traffic was 
made of this sacred commodity, for which its venders 
were not always obliged to go to Palestine in order to 
get a supply and obtain a good price for it. This 
ought not to astonish us, since even in our days 
handkerchiefs, which had been put in the bosom of a 
man that was hanged, have been used as a talisman and 
charm against disease, and the very rope, with which 
an unfortunate culprit has been tied, is believed by 
many superstitious individuals to be possessed with the 
virtue of curing diseases and sores, and has often been 
bought and worn for that purpose. 

The relics of the holy bishop Augustine, who, in his 
book of The City of God, had so much extolled the 
merit of foreign relics, were soon to become an object 
of veneration and devotion in their turn. He died in 
430, when the Vandals besieged Hippo, now Bona, in 
Africa, of which he was a bishop. Les eveques 
catholiques d'Afrique," says his biographer, "chasses 
de leurs sieges par Tharasmond, roi des Vandales, 
emporterent ses reliques en Sardaigne, lieu de leur exil. 
Luitprand, roi des Lombards, les transporta environ 
200 ans apres a Pavie sa capitale. Son culte re^ut 
de grands accroissements en Orient et en Occident 
par la multiplication des religieux et des chanoines 



260 THE OPPONENTS OF SUPERSTITION 



regiiliers qui prireiit son nom et se soiimirent a sa 
regie."* 

Many no doubt at that time, as at later periods, did 
not suffer themselves to be carried away by the torrent 
of superstition which threatened to overflow the Church 
of Christ; but they were silent and remained content 
to worship God in the secret of their hearts, according 
to the jDrecepts of his holy word. However, some 
ecclesiastics at the end of the fourth and at the 
beginning of the fifth century, attempted to raise 
their voices against the growing superstition of the 
multitude, which regarded as the greatest models of 
sanctity, and the highest patterns of perfection, those 
men, who practised the most severe mortifications, 
emaciated their bodies by the most austere fastings and 
penance, or, after the example of the Indian Saints, 
inflicted upon themselves the most severe torments. 
They tried to turn away the people from the worship of 
the relics of martyrs and to bring them back to the 
genuine piety of the early Christians. But the votaries 
of superstition, who were superior in number, reputation, 
and authority, branded them as heretics and reduced 

* The Catholic bishops of Africa, driven from their sees by 
Tharasmund, king of the Vandals, earned his relics to Sardinia, the 
place of their exile. Luitprand, king of the Lombards, removed 
ihera about 200 years after to Pavia his capital. His worship 
received a great expansion in the East and West from the number 
of monks and regular canons, who took his name, and submitted 
iliemselves to his rule. 



ALWAYS ACCUSED OF HERESY. 



251 



them to silence. For from those days to the present, 
all those pious Christians, who dared to attempt restoring 
the pure religion of the Gospel, were accused of heresy ; 
they were represented hy the ruling powers in the 
Church as rehels against God and the enemies of Christ, 
and they were often persecuted, punished and even put 
to death as monsters. 

We cannot fomi a just idea to what extent sterling 
piety and the pure spirit of the gospel untainted 
with superstitious practices still prevailed in that age, 
from the writings of a few men, which have been 
transmitted to us. Though some of these writers 
were still eminent for their zeal in the service of God, 
yet they deviated in several important particulars 
from the means of sanctification recommended in the 
Gospel, and were led astray by the growing opinion 
that supports and means of grace were to be obtained 
from the spirits of departed saints and the veneration 
which was due to their mortal remains. Besides beino- 

o 

dazzled by the influence, which the rulers of the Church 
had acquired over princes and people, the ecclesiastics 
of those days, to whose class these writers almost 
exclusively belonged, began to consider themselves as 
the only vicegerents of God upon earth, and to look 
\vpon their own decrees as the mandates of heaven. It 
is in the mass of the people, of that numerous class of 
men which forms the sinew of society, that religious 



252 



VIGILANTIUS 



and social virtues thrive most, without ostentation and 
without display. As sincere religious conviction espe- 
cially holds its seat in the innermost recess of the heart, 
we cannot expect to find any account, which should 
enahle us to judge accurately of the extent, to which 
those new ideas, those excitable feeling3 concerning 
austerity of life, the veneration for the relics of saints 
and martyrs, and the invocation of their departed spirits 
had been carried at this epoch. Some considered them 
as harmless, others as highly beneficial, and others as 
injurious to God's honour and detrimental to men. 

Vigilantius, a presbyter of Gaul, whose name has been 
handed down to us as that of a heretic and a scoffer by 
the lovers of those new doctrines, was one of those who 
towards the end of the fourth century and the beginning 
of the fifth, inveighed with most boldness against those 
abuses. He denied that the tombs and the bones of 
martyrs were to be honoured with any sort of homage 
or worship, and therefore censured the pilgrimages that 
were made to places, which were reputed holy. He 
turned into derision the prodigies which were said to be 
wrought in the temples consecrated to martyrs ; and 
maintained that mortifications and fastings, the celibacy 
of the clergy and the various austerities of the monastic 
life had nothing acceptable to God. He moreover 
asserted, and indeed with reason, that the custom of 
burning tapers at the tombs of martyrs at broad day was 



DID NOT PERVERT THE GOSPEL. 253 

impriidently borrowed from the ancient superstition of 
the Pagans. 

Whether he entertained any opinions contrary to the 
orthodox belief of the early Church respecting the 
Gospel, we are not told even by his accusers. Therefore 
we cannot have the least doubt, but he raised his voice 
only against that new worship, the traces of which are 
so early to be found in the Church, and which may be 
said to be the new^ Gospel against which St. Paul fore- 
warns us. But in an age, when austerity of life, fasting 
and bodily mortifications, voluntary poverty, pilgrimage 
and the worship, if not of saints, at least of their bones 
were regarded as the highest perfection, and the surest 
way to heaven by the enthusiastic leaders of the Church, 
and the admiring and credulous multitude, such asser- 
tions on his part were more than sufficient to brand him 
as a perverse heretic. Also he brought upon himself 
the wrath of the choleric Jerome, and he soon sank into 
silence under the number and authority of the votaries 
of the fashionable superstition. Jerome took up his pen 
against him and attacked him with his usual virulence. 
He called him the most impure monster that the earth 
ever produced ; but he did not charge him with the least 
perversion of the truth of the Gospel, though many 
errors were very prevalent in those times. Monsters 
of different kinds," he said, ^^have been seen in the 
world : Isaiah speaks of Centaurs, Sirens, and other 



254 



CRIMES IMPUTED TO HTM. 



such like ; J ob makes a mysterious description of 
Leviathan and Behemoth. Poets relate fables about 
Cerberus, the Wild Boar of the forest of Erimanthus, 
and the Hydra with many heads. Virgil tells the story 
of Cacus : Spain has produced Gerion, vv^hich had three 
bodies : Gaul alone had been exempt from them, and 
none but eloquent and courageous men had ever been 
seen there, when Vigilantius or rather Dormitantms has 
appeared all at once, combating with an impure spirit 
against the spirit of God. He maintains that we ought 
not to honour the tombs of martyrs, nor sing Hallelujah 
except at the feast of Easter ; he condemns vigils, he 
calls celibacy a heresy." In those times when mona- 
chism and pilgrimages had become so much in vogue, 
it v;as imputed a great crime to Vigilantius to assert 
that those who distributed all their substance to the 
poor, through voluntary humility, or sent a part of their 
treasures to Jerusalem w^ere not the more acceptable to 
God for it. Already, then, all those who ventured to 
teach publicly that those who kept the vows they bad- 
made to God at their baptism, and lived according to 
those rides of piety and virtue laid down in the Gospel, 
had an equal title to the rewards of futurity, and that 
fasting and other acts of penance were of no merit with 
God, were equally condemned as heretics. 

80 if the Christian writers of the fourth century are 
to be our guides in all things, we must not remain 



GUIDES TO BE REJECTED. 



255 



content with following the precepts of the Gospel^ and 
placing all our confidence, all onr hope in Christ's 
redemption ; we must not dare to approach him, who 
says to us : Come unto me, all that lahour, and are 
heavy laden, and I will refresh you ; " we must no 
longer look upon him as our only Mediator with the 
Father, and as a merciful Saviour, ever ready to hear the 
sighings of a contrite heart : but we must view him as 
an angry and severe judge, to whose throne of grace we 
are not worthy to send up our prayers and raise up our 
supplicant hands. We must therefore seek other 
mediators, who have the power, and are willing to 
intercede for us. We must not only call upon the 
blessed Virgin, the apostles and the martyrs, whose 
relics were venerated and worshipped by Ambrose, 
Jerome, and so many of their contemporaries ; but we 
must implore the protection of all the saints, known or 
unknown, who have been added to the calendar ever 
since that time. We must light tapers before their 
statues, and upon their altars ; we must place nosegays 
of flowers in their hands, and gratefully acknowledge 
that it is through their powerful intercession that we 
have obtained relief from the burden of our sins. Let 
us send up our fervent prayers to them and hope for 
our eternal salvation through them ; or if we wish to 
enjoy any earthly blessing, let us vow to visit the 
churches where their relics are deposited, or their sacred 



266 WORSHIP OF MEN AND OF THING^o 

image is kept, and to pay for a mass to be said at their 
altar, we may then confidently hope that our prayers 
will be graciously heard. 

Such must be the conclusions that those, who take 
the Fathers of the fourth and fifth centuries, and even of 
the third, as their guides in all things pertaining to re- 
ligion must come to. For although the system of 
worship, which I have just described, and which is the 
one now prevailing both in the Greek and Roman 
Churches, was not developed in the time of Jerome, 
Augustine, and Ambrose, and they probably would have 
shrunk with horror from the consequences which have 
flowed from the practice which they encouraged ; yet 
that morbid tendency to see a miraculous influence in 
men reputed holy on account of their austere mode of 
life, and in the mortal remains of the dead, naturally 
paved the way to that worship of men and of things 
which stood pre-eminent in most branches of the 
Christian Church for many centuries. 

But those who protest against the superstitions and 
heresies of the Church of Rome, are asked to shew when 
and how all those abuses and en-ors of which they com- 
plain, suddenly overwhelmed the Church, w^ich had 
been kept pure up to that period.* Those who ask 
such questions, do not attend to the progressive steps 

* See " The Church of the Fathers." Its author had not yet 
made his final change, when this was written. 



OPINIONS GRADUALLY FORMED, 257 

of the human mind; for else, if truth and not the 
triumph of party or of preconceived opinions be their 
object, they would readily find an answer to their 
questions within themselves. In every countr}', and 
under every clime, it is not suddenly, like an avalanche, 
that manners and customs are introduced and habits are 
fonned. It is by degrees that practices creep in among 
individuals or small communities : they extend further 
as the public spirit becomes favourable to their recep- 
tion, and at last they become national or general. What 
people were ever more deeply rooted in their manners 
and religious superstitions than the Hindoos are at the 
present day, or than they were two thousand years ago ? 
Yet can we doubt but those manners and superstitions 
must have been gradual, and were not all introduced at 
once ? If the Brahmins were to ask the Christians, who 
attack those superstitions, to shew how those errors 
which they wish to destroy, suddenly overwhelmed the 
Indian nation, they certainly could not do it, yet they 
would not conchide from their inability to bring such 
proofs as the Brahmins required, that these are divine 
institutions. 

We have the divine Scriptures, which we believe to 
have been dictated by God for the moral government of 
his people and for the religious worship which he re- 
quires from them. We find that in the course of ages, 
practices which are forbidden by those Scriptures or 

R 



258 



RESPECT TURNED INTO WORSHIP. 



contrary to their spirit have been introduced among the 
mam body of those who profess to be guided by them : 
therefore we rightly conclude that they are errors, which 
have crept in, which we are bound to reject, as we value 
our obedience to God's commandments. The early 
Christians kept first relics as a remembrance ; these 
relics soon began to be looked upon as a preservative 
against evils, both spiritual and temporal. The excite- 
ment caused by these new ideas produced its natural 
eifects. The martyrs ceased to be remembered and 
r honoured as the champions of truth ; they were no longer 
mere objects of respect ; they began to be considered as 
the special dispensers of God's favours ; they became 
in the minds of their worshippers superior beings, who 
were to be invoked, to whom prayers and supplications 
were to be directed. The Jews, with so many other 
traditions, had imbibed the notion that the souls of the 
dead did not come to their final rest, till after their 
bodies had been buried ; many even believed that they 
wandered about space for a whole year ; so they prayed 
for the rest of their departed friends during that 
period ; the same ideas prevailed in the heathen world. 
In the second and third centuries the Platonic idea that 
none but the souls of purified and superior men were 
admitted into the immediate presence of the Deity, 
after death, having been engrafted by some new con- 
.verts to Christianity upon that old Jewish superstition 



WORSHIP PAID TO SYMBOLS. 



259 



produced by degrees that system of purgatory, whicli^ 
though so contrary to the doctrine of redemption, 
became afterwards the leading dogma of the greatest 
number of Christians. 

The ancient Egyptians did not at first worship onions^ 
they only held them sacred as the symbols of the uni- 
versal Deity. Yet history informs us that, at the epoch 
when Egypt became a Roman conquest, the descend- 
ants of those Egyptians paid divine honours to those 
symbols, which to their fathers had been only the 
emblematic figure of Pantheism. 

We behold amongst us the danger of exhibiting 
symbols to the people in a much more awful instance. 
When the administration of the Lord's supper had 
ceased to be made in the plain form which was followed 
by the primitive Christians, the bread and the wine 
were left exposed before their distribution, and they 
were sometimes held up to view, that they might be 
seen by the catechumens, who not only did not partake 
of the sacrament, but were even kept out of the precinct 
of the Church, where it was administered. These 
symbols were first contemplated with a certain religious 
respect, but as in the figurative language of Scripture, 
they were called the body and blood of Christ, and 
were afterwards ofiered up to God as an unbloody 
sacrifice to commemorate the death of Him, who by 
one offering has perfected for ever them that are sancti- 

R 2 



260 EFFECTS OF AMBITION IN THE CLERGY. 

fied— (Heb. X. 14.)— They began by degrees to re- 
ceive adoration from some as the real body and blood 
of Christ. However, the Church of Rome in the fifth 
century seems to have still held the orthodox doctrine^ 
for Pope Gelasius, who lived about the end of that 
century, wrote thus: ''Surely the sacraments of the 
body and blood of the Lord, which we receive, are a 
divine thing; forasmuch as through these, we are 
made partakers of the divine nature. And yet, the 
substance or nature of bread and wine does not cease 
to he ; and certainly, an image and similitude of the 
body and blood of Christ are celebrated in action of the 
mysteries."*^ 

This adoration of the elements would probably never 
have taken place, had not the Christian ministers of 
the third, fourth, and subsequent centuries, been am- 
bitious of taking the place of the Jewish and Pagan 
priesthood. All sacrifices had ceased ; for now once 
in the end of the world, Christ had appeared to put 
away sin by the sacrifice of himself:" yet, men, ac- 
customed as they had been to sacrifices, could not divest 
themselves of the idea of a sacrifice. So, after the in- 
troduction of ceremonial rites in the Church, the bread 
and wine were sacramentally offered, in commemora- 
tion of the death of Christ, and this ofifering was called 
an unbloody sacrifice. The very term, unbloody 
* Against the Nestorian and Eutychian Heresies. 



TRUE ORTHODOX DOCTRINE. 



261 



sacrifice, shows that they did not believe that the 
elements were changed into flesh and blood, as was 
afterwards believed, or else the sacrifice would have 
ceased to be unbloody. Then, in imitation of the 
unbloody sacrifices, or rather offerings of the Romans, 
the bread and the cup were held up to the gaze of the 
people. As many Christians worshipped the tombs and 
relics of martyrs in those days, for which they were 
reproached and ridiculed even by the heathens them- 
selves, so by bowing before the elements thus exposed 
to their view, they soon began also to worship them. 
To justify such an adoration, the idea that they were 
converted into the real body and blood of Christ began 
to be countenanced and entertained. Yet it was not 
widely spread till the eighth century, when doctors and 
theologians were much divided upon it and warmly 
advocated opposite opinions upon this point, as they had 
done upon so many others ever since the first days of the 
Church. The emperor Charles the Bald, who lived in 
the ninth century, being perplexed by those disputes 
requested a priest named Bertramn, to write an exposi- 
tion of the true orthodox doctrine. In compliance with 
this request, this learned piiest wTote a treatise which 
still exists, in which he revievv^ed the conflicting opinions 
which prevailed in his time and proved by the concurrent 
testimony of the early Fathers of the Church, that no 
change takes place in the bread and wine, after conse- 



262 TAUGHT BY THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND. 

cration. He clearly explains that they are not themselves 
the very body and blood of Christy but that, as St. Paul 
expresses it ; the cup of blessing which we bless, is the 
communion of the blood of Christ, and the bread which 
we break, is the communion of the body of Christ — 
(1 Cor. X. 16.) The doctrine of the reformed Church 
of England on the Eucharist, as laid down in her 
Articles, is perfectly conformable to that which this 
learned monk and priest proves to have been the 
doctrine of the ancient Church. 

As the Israelites, though placed under the imme- 
diate government of God, forsook the Lord, and served 
Baal and Ashtaroth after the death of Joshua and of 
the elders, who had seen all the great works of the 
Lord — (Judges ii.) so the Christians, by departing 
from the spirit of the Gospel, introduced a new worship 
contrary to the doctrine of the apostles and of their 
disciples, who had seen the gifts, with which the infant 
Church was miraculously endowed. 



CHAPTEE XX. 



" Jesus said unto her, Neither do I condemn thee : go and sin 
no more. Then spake Jesus again unto them, saying, I am the 
light of the world : he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, 
but shall have the light of life." John viii. 11, 12. 



The first Christians gloried in the cross of Christ : so 
do all spiritual Christians at this day. But the first 
Christians did not want the sight of the cross to excite 
those feelings in them, neither do now those, who do not 
live unto themselves, but unto Him, who died for them 
and rose again — (2 Cor. v. 15.) When the relics of 
martyrs and other men had become the objects of so deep 
veneration, it was to be expected that the wood of the 
cross should receive particular honours and a special 
worship. It is pretended that Helena, mother of Con- 
stantino miraculously discovered the true cross, which 
had lain buried for near three hundred years. Churches 
vied with each other to become possessed of that precious 



264 



"WORSHIP OF THE CROSS. 



relic, which certainly must have been a valuable one, if 
it was real. Supposing it lo have been the true crosS;, 
upon which Christ suffered, it was impossible that it 
could be of sufficient dimensions, that those communities, 
which claimed to have a share of it, should be possessed 
of even a very small particle yet many Churches pre- 
tend even now to have still some considerable pieces. 

It became an object of particular worship. Festivals 
were instituted in its honour and have continued to this 
day. In the hymns, which are sung on the occasion, 
it is personified, it is addressed as a supernatural being. 
It is invoked as the only hope, as the salvation and glory 
of the world ; of which the following stanza is a proof : 

O Crux ave, spes unica — Hoc passionis tempore — 
Auge piis justitiam — Reisque dona veniam."f It is 
vain to attempt to say that these blessings are expected 
from Christ, who died upon the cross. Those who re- 
peat these lines, if they understand them, address the 
cross alone; and, if they really feel any devotional 
emotion, it is excited by the cross and the cross alone 

* We are told that so great a distribution of this precious trea- 
sure was made at Jerusalem, where a part of it was kept, the other 
part having been sent by Helena to Constantinople, that the whole 
universe was in a short time filled Avith pieces of the true cross. 
And to account for that wonderful distribution, it was asserted 
afterwards that by a perpetual miracle this part of the cross did not 
diminish, because the whole of that part said to have been left by 
Helena remained at Jerusalem, sealed up in a silver case, until the 
time of Heraclins. 

f Hail, O cross, our only hope, — do thou in this passion time 
increase justice in the pious, and grant pardon to the guilty. 



USE OF THE LATIN LANGUAGE. 



265 



for the time being. The only thing, which can be said 
as an excuse for the bulk of the people, is that they do 
not understand what they sing, and their invocation may 
be addressed to Christ, for aught they know, while in 
reality they are praying to the Cross. For it is one of 
the inconveniences arising from that uniformity, w^hich 
the popes strove so long to establish, that the people 
never hear one prayer in their own language in those 
countries, where the Roman Church is predominant : 
every thing is in Latin, except the sermon, and some- 
times the Gospel of the day, which the preacher reads 
before he begins his sermon. In this country the clergy 
have so far yielded to the spirit of reformation, that they 
repeat prayers in English before and after mass, and 
sometimes in the afternoon service,^ but it is not so 
abroad, where repeating prayers in the language of the 
people would be considered a dangerous innovation. 

It is said that an universal language alone is fit to be 
used in the service of an universal Church. But is this 
Church universal ? Besides that it forms a very small 
minority of the human race, more than half of the Christian 
world is not in communion with it. As to the unity of 
which it boasts, the history of the councils, both before 
the supremacy of the bishop of Rome was acknowledged, 
and after, even without excepting the last, proves how 

* The same reform was introduced in Austria by Joseph 11,, 
who ordered hymns in German to be sung in Churches. 



266 NO REAL UNITY IN THE CHURCH OF ROME. 

far unity ever was from prevailing in its bosom. For a 
long period, history presents us with councils arrayed 
against councils, popes against popes, orders against 
orders. The doctrine of grace has quite as much 
divided the doctors of the Roman Churchy as it has 
divided the Refomi Churches in later ages. Even now 
that an apparent unity does exists if the pope was to 
convene another council, the disputes that would arise 
on many important points would shew that unity is as 
far from that pretended universal Church as ever. 
However, public opinion is too strong now, and the 
public mind is too enlightened to admit of the thought 
that the leaders of the Church could ever dare to meet 
again in the face of Europe. Whatever discussions 
may arise, they must for the future be settled in private 
conclaves, but never more in open day. It is true that 
all the Roman Catholic body acknowledges, nominally 
at least, the supremacy of the pope ; but is it not 
notorious that all shades of opinions are to be found in 
it as among the protestants, varying through every 
gradation from infidelity to the most abject superstition. 

But supposing that they all agreed, that they were all 
of one mind; we might apply with more truth, to that 
unattainable unity the words, which the present pope 
(Gregory XVI.) used on one occasion against toleration 
in religion. When he was elected to the pontifical see, 
in 1831, several provinces of the States of the Church, 



ENCYCLICAL LETTER OF GREGORY XVI. 267 

tired of the mal-administration of the priests, had risen 
in insurrection and thrown oif the yoke of the papal 
power. No sooner was the j'jope freed from the anxiety 
of losing his crown by the help of Austrian bayonets, 
which accomplished the work which he had not the 
power to perform himself, and which even now alone 
support the tiara upon his head, than he addressed his 
first encyclical letter to the bishops and others, w^ho 
acknowledge his spiritual sway. In this letter he 
inveighed mosi bitterly against that most pernicious 
doctrine, as he called it, the offspring of latitudinarianism 
and infidelity, which is called toleration, and then 
exclaimed: ^^But what greater error than liberty in 
error?" We could retort his words with more justice 
and say: "You bind men under your yoke and you 
oblige them to believe doctrines, that are the inventions 
of men, and are subversive of the truth of the Gospel, 
and then you boast of your unity ; but what greater 
error than unity in error ?" The priests of the Grand 
Lama are more united than those of the pope ; the 
number of people w^ho acknowledge him as the head of 
their religion, is probably as great as the whole Roman 
Catholic body. They equally believe him to be in- 
fallible ; yet who will agree from that unity that the 
Dalhi Lama is the vicegerent of the Deity upon earth, 
or rather is, as his priests pretend, the incorporated 
Deity itself? 



268 DIVISION AMONG PROTESTANTS. 

Protestants are much divided, it is true. In this 
country, especially, where freedom of conscience is 
almost unlimited, the spirit of dissent is carried to a 
very great excess. But there is this difference, that if, 
as no doubt is too frequently the case, some men 
indulge in erroneous practices, and teach false and 
heretical doctrines, contrary to the word of God, and 
derogatory to his honour and glory, they do it on their 
own responsibility ; they go out of the reformed Church, 
which is in no way accountable for their errors. 
Whereas, all the superstitious vagaries, false miracles 
and deceits, such as the worship of relics, the bubbling 
up of the blood of St. January at Naples, and many 
others of the same kind, as well as all the heresies and 
false doctrines which Christians, who are guided by the 
word of God alone have rejected, are encouraged and 
sanctioned by the clergy of the Roman Church. 
However, to those who consider separation warranted 
only by a difference of opinion upon fundamental 
doctrines, this tendency to separate and to form 
independent communities must appear an overstrained 
interpretation of these words of our Saviour : " Again, I 
say unto you, that if tw^o of you shall agree upon earth 
as touching any thing that they shall ask, it shall be 
done for them of my Father who is in heaven. For 
where two or three are gathered together in my name, 
there am I hi the midst of them"— (Matt, xviii. 19.) 



DUTY OF UNION". 



269 



Though this division is to be deplored, it is no proof 
of the unsoundness of the doctrines of the protestant 
Churches, as is argued by unthinking Roman Catholics, 
to whom outward unity is everything, and who have no 
idea of a Church, but that which acknowledges one man 
for its head, and that man, the pope. Our Saviour 
prayed that his disciples might be united, and that 
they might be one even as the Father and he are 
one. Therefore it is the duty of Christians to pre- 
serve union in the bond of peace. Yet real union 
may subsist between many men, who, on account of 
conscientious scruples, differ on certain minor points, 
if they follow after charity, and do not substitute for 
unity of faith the suggestions of their own feelinga, 
and prejudices. Our Saviour says : "Verily, verily, I 
say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth 
on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not 
come into condemnation ; but is passed from death 
unto life." Therefore all those who have faith in Christ, 
as the Saviour in whom we have redemption through his 
blood, who is the image of the invisible God, the first- 
born of every creature, in whom it pleased the Father 
that all fulness should dwell, are orthodox Christians 
and real members of the Catholic Church. It w^ould 
be very desirable that they should all be joined into 
one body outw^ardly : but we are not to judge those, 
whom Jesus Christ himself did not condemn for not 



270 FAITH IN CHRIST EEAL UNION. 

walking with the main body of his followers. For we 
see in the ninth chapter of St. Luke and also of St. 
Mark, that John said, Master, we saw one casting 
out devils in thy name, and we forbad him, because he 
folio weth not with us. And Jesus said unto him. 
Forbid him not: for he that is not against us, is for us." 
But in reality, the difference between orthodox pro- 
testants is more a difference of discipline and Church 
government, than one of doctrine, and there is really 
among them a greater unity of faith, than among the 
members of the Roman Church, many of whom profess 
themselves attached to it, and yet reject many of its 
doctrines, or do not consider them as necessaiy. 

Besides, divisions did alv\^ays exist, even in the time 
of the apostles. St. Paul rejoiced that Christ was 
preached, though he was preached by some in a spirit 
of envy and of strife, as he wrote to the Philippians: 
What then ? notwithstanding, every way, whether in 
pretence or in truth, Christ is preached ; and I therein 
do rejoice, yea, and will rejoice" — (Phil. i. 18.) 
Divisions were perhaps never more numerous than in 
the three first centuries, and they continued until the 
iron hand of the rulers of the Church armed with the 
weapons of secular power put them down by persecu- 
* tions, torture, and death, and thus enforced an apparent 
uniformity. Even now the means employed to continue 
that uniformity and keep the -people in subjection to the 



MEANS USED TO ENEORCE UNION. 271 

pope and his clergy, are very stringent and arbitrary. 
But in those countries, where the Roman clergy bear 
the sway, let the people be allowed and taught to read 
the Bible, let the voice of those who expose the innova- 
tions and errors of the Church of Rome be suffered to 
be heard, let their writings be allowed to be read, the 
effects will soon be manifest among the thinking part of 
the population, who seek the truth and not the triumph 
of a system. 

In other countries, where the clergy have not the 
assistance of the civil power, to enforce uniformity and 
to prevent contact with Bible Christians, they exert a 
moral influence which is hardly less effectual. They make 
it a crime for any of the people under their influence 
to read the Bible used by protestants, or any of their 
books. In Ireland any one, who sets his foot once only 
in a Protestant Church, is interdicted from the sacraments 
for at least twelve months and submitted to a severe 
penance. In books used for an examination, previous 
to confession, among other sins therein enumerated, is 
the grievous crime of saying that men can be saved in 
any Church, provided they follow the rule of the Gospel. 
It is made a mortal sin to join in prayer whether in 
private or in public with those of another communion, 
and the people are taught that, if they have had the 
misfortune to commit such a sin, they are bound to 
confess it to the priest under pain of sacrilege and of 
eternal damnation. 



272 



THE LATIN VULGATE. 



Those, who read the Bible, are obliged to read only 
the authorized version (as it is called), that is the 
translation of the Latin Vulgate. This Latin Vulgate, 
which is liable to so many objections, merely because 
it ranks among the canonical books, six books rejected 
as apocryphal by the consentient testimony of all ages, 
and by Jerome himself, who w^as the translator of it, 
contains besides many errors and inaccuracies, which 
many scholars have swelled to the number of several 
thousands, and some of them on very important points. 
Yet the Coimcil of Trent decreed that the edition then 
extant was to be considered as authentic, and that no 
one was to dare or presume to reject it under any pretext 
whatever. The errors, however, of this authentic book 
were so manifest, that Sixtus V. commanded a new 
revision of the text to be made, and forbade the use of 
any other edition than the new one which he authorizedr 
So this old Vulgate edition, which by the decree of the 
fourth session of the Council of Trent, was to be 
considered as authentic in public readings, disputes, 
preachings, and expositions, was declared by this pope 
to be unfit and forbidden to be used. Still, this new 
edition was found to be so exceedingly incorrect that 
his successor, Clement VIII. suppressed it, and 
published a new edition with a similar prohibition. So, 
that by the admission of popes themselves, this 
authorized version, which, as it is said in the decree of 



THE BIBLE AN UNKNOWN BOOK. 273 

the Council of Trent, has been approved in the Church 
by the use of so many ages, is very defective. Those 
viho read the Latin edition, read at least the text, such 
as it is, without note or comment. But the translations 
in any of the vulgar languages generally have interpre* 
tations, which explain every important passage in the 
sense given to it by the Roman Church, and no one is 
allowed to interpret it in any other sense, without 
incuiTing a severe penalty. (Qui contravenerint, per 
Ordinariosdeclarenturetpaenis a jure statutispuniantur.) 
C. T. Sessio quarta. 

Even such as it is, the Bible is not the book of the 
Roman Catholics. In France, Spain, Italy, &c., it is 
unknown. Not only it is not read ; but it is not even 
seen. The bulk of the population never saw a Bible in 
their life. A narration of the lives of the principal 
Scriptural characters, and of the events in which they 
were concerned goes by the name of the Bible, and is 
read as the true Bible by most people, who have no 
notion of any other. In this country, it is true, some of 
the priests tell the people to read the Bible ; but they do 
not recommend it as an absolute duty : so that com- 
paratively few families keep or read it. It does not 
form a part of the religious instruction of youth of either 
sex. I believe that in most countries the Greek and 
Latin Testament is translated in colleges and classical 
schools, at least it is so in France; but in female 

s 



274 



BOOKS SUBSTITUTED FOR THE BIBLE. 



establishments, neither the New nor the Old Testament 
is ever brought under the notice of the pupils. The 
lives of saints, and other books of devotion, as they are 
called, and particularly books devoted to the worship of 
the Virgin Mary, are infinitely preferred to and sub- 
stituted for the Bible.- The religion of a Roman 
Catholic is not in the Bible but in his catechism. 

It is not therefore surprising that the mind of the 
people being fenced from early childhood against the 
admission of truth, they should continue to hold the 
errors which they have received, because they are taught 
by a Church, which they are bound to consider as in- 
fallible in all its doctrines and decisions, whose traditions 
are of equal force with the written word of God, and out 
of whose pale they are told there is no salvation. 

It is also for this reason, that many men of education, 
when they become acquainted with the history of 

* The most popular ones at present are the books of Alphonsus 
Ligiiori. In one entitled The Glories of Mary," it is said at the 
6th Chapter: "Imperio Virginis omnia famulantur, etiam Deus." 
That all is subject to Mary's empire, even God himself. Jesus 
has rendered Mary omnipotent, the one is omnipotent by nature, 
the other is omnipotent by grace ; that is to say, as it was revealed 
to S t. Bridget, Jesus has obliged himself to grant all the desires and 
requests of his blessed mother, not willing to refuse her anj^thing in 
heaven, since she has refused him nothing on earth. St. Bridget 
heard the saints say to Mary: " Queen of heaven! elect of the 
Lord ! what is impossible to you." To this corresponds a celebrated 
adage of a certain Father, "You, O Holy Virgin, can effect by 
your prayers all that God can operate by his power." Such senti- 
ments excite in the hearts of devotees the most tender emotions, and 
they take for spiritual graces those raptures which are only the 
feelings of the natural mind. Hence the love of Mary — hence the 
love of a favourite image — hence the attachment to whatever draws 
the affections and interests the heart. 



ERROR OF UNBELIEVERS. 275 

mythology, cannot close their eyes to the startling facts, 
that a great number of those dogmas and ceremonies, 
which they have been taught to believe and practise, 
have a great affinity with those of the heathen world. 
They see the worship of saints and angels substituted 
for that of the intermediate deities of antiquity ; the 
Virgin Mary put in the place of the Queen of Heaven, 
so long the principal object of worship in Arabia and 
Phoenicia, from which countries the worship of the 
Virgin was imported into the West. They see the 
veneration for the tombs and the worship of ancestors, 
so sacred among the Romans and other nations of 
antiquity, turned into the worship of the earthly re- 
mains of saints and martyrs. They behold the very 
bread of the sacrament shaped in the form of a sun, and 
even the instrument in which the host is placed, when 
it is exposed to adoration, made in the figure of a 
radiant sun, of which the host is the centre. They see 
in this image a complete imitation of the mysteries of 
Mithra, or the God- Sun of the Persians, whose wor- 
shippers had become very numerous and powerful in the 
Roman empire, and were the most strenuous supporters 
of heathenish rites under the first Christian emperors. 
So being generally very imperfectly acquainted with 
Scripture and the history of Christianity, they confound 
these innovations, these borrowed ornaments with 
primitive truth and they become unbelievers. In doing 

s 2 



276 SUPERSTITION THE CAUSE OF UNBELIEF. 

tins, they act on the same principle, as when they 
believed the Koman Church to be the only true Church. 
They had been taught, that it could not err in matters 
of faith and practice, and that truth was no where to be 
found but in its bosom. They find it loaded with the 
spoils of vanquished Paganism. They see the errors of 
the Fathers and of their times canonized by the venera- 
tion of later ages, and they do not distinguish the fictions 
blended with the history of the first ages of Christianity 
from Christianity itself. This sad mistake is but too 
common among many well-meaning men who confound 
tradition with Scripture, who do not discern those re- 
mains of Roman and Greek mythology engrafted upon 
the Gospel from the Gospel itself. You see then how 
important it is to know and to study the Holy Scriptures, 
and not to admit any doctrine or cherish any practice, 
which is not strictly sanctioned by them. 

An acquaintance with Church history is likewise 
highly necessary to enable us to distinguish the pure 
doctrine of Christ, as taught by his apostles and their 
immediate followers from those additions which mis- 
taken piety, blind enthusiasm, and indiscreet zeal 
brought by degrees into the Church. It will enable us 
to trace with accuracy the errors which, in the first 
centuries of the Church, many converts imbued with 
oriental philosophy tried to mix with the doctrine of 
the divine nature of Christ. By it we shall discern 



IMPORTANCE OF CHURCH HISTORY. 277 

those idle inquiries which the subtle spirit of the Greeks 
prompted them to institute into the relation, in which 
the Son of God stands with the Father, and into the 
connection between the divine and human nature of 
Jesus Christ. 

We shall see that the first Christians remained con- 
tent with worshipping God and placing all their hope 
of salvation in the redemption of Christ by his sufferings 
on the cross; that they regarded him as the only 
mediator and intercessor, through whom they could 
obtain access to the Father, and that they believed 
inward sorrow and sincere repentance for their sins to be 
the only means by which they could obtain mercy and 
be justified before God through faith in Christ. We 
shall see the belief in justification by faith alone 
gradually diminishing, intermediate intercessors soon 
admitted and afterwards invoked by Eastern Christians, 
and the ecclesiastical penance established for the 
outward discipline of the Churches every where con- 
founded with the repentance of the Gospel. We shall 
witness a new power substituted for the influence of the 
spirit upon the heart of man — -the power of the priests. 
Through them alone the penitent sinner could hence= 
forth be justified before God. Then the greatest 
importance was attached to external acts of penance^ 
tears, mortifications of all kinds, pilgrimages, and the 
repeating of psalms, or later, the rosary a set number 



278 



SALVATION BY FAITH SET ASIDE. 



of times. The oftener these practices were repeated, 
and the more severe were the mortifications, the more 
men were thought to become holy, and the more they 
gained heaven in theirs and others' opinion. 

We shall see indulgences from ecclesiastical penance 
applied later to the relief of the souls both of the living 
and the dead from the fire of a transitory state, which 
the invention of the Greeks had supposed necessary to 
purify the souls of men, previous to their re-union with 
the soul of the imiverse, from which they were thought 
to have emanated, and a belief in w^hich was adopted by 
many Christians, as they receded from the vivifying 
doctrine that men are saved by grace, through faith, 
which is the gift of God. Then works began to be 
considered as distinct from faith. V/hereas faith implies 
the renewal of the spirit of man, his becoming a new 
creature in Christ, his putting on new affections, new 
desires with an entire submission to the will of God, 
without which he cannot please him nor obtain the 
salvation, which the incarnation and the death of Jesus 
Christ have purchased for all that receive him. 

We shall see some bishops extending gradually their 
influence over the Churches of their respective districts, 
and their power becoming commensurate with the power 
of the prefect or civil magistrate of the province. At 
last a few of them placed in the capitals of the Roman 
empire, or in the ancient capital cities of once powerful 



RISE OF THE PAPAL POWER. 



279 



kingdoms will be found to have risen to pre-eminence 
over all the others, until by the concurrence of many 
circumstances, which they knew how to improve, the 
bishops of Rome after having been long the first citizens 
of the queen of cities, rose superior to kings and princes 
and engTossed in themselves the universal empire, 
l^romised by fate to the eternal city, by asserting their 
claims to be lords over the whole Church. Then as 
they pretended to hold exclusively the keys of heaven 
upon earth, they could punish and absolve, whom they 
€hose. They were the fountain of grace and pardon ; 
they could loose and unloose ; they could retain and 
remit sins. It was therefore from them alone, that 
indulgences could flow. They granted them not only 
to those w^ho had submitted themselves to works of 
penance, but to all those, who recited certain prayers, 
who visited Rome in jubilees, who made war upon 
heretics or infidels, or who prayed in certain Churches, 
or before certain images and relics. Hence there arose 
with time the most disgraceful traffic in those com- 
modities. Popes to fill their coffers or satisfy the 
avarice of their families sent men, who preached the 
value of those indulgences, and sold them at a fixed 
price according to the means of the purchasers. The 
permission of. eating meat in lent and on days of 
abstinence was bought and sold very nearly in the 
same way. 



280 



CONTINUATION OF ABUSES. 



But you will be told these were abuses, which have 
been reformed, and which every sincere Catholic 
laments. It is true tickets are no longer sold, by which 
so many souls are liberated from purgatory, according 
to the value, which has been paid. But people still pay 
for masses, which they wish to be ^jaid for the repose of 
the souls of their departed friends, and those who have 
money can still obtain leave to eat meat, whenevet they 
like, if they choose to apply for it. Indulgences in a 
thousand different forms are still sought and gained by 
the devotees and the superstitious. Millions of images, 
medals, and crucifixes, are still endowed with the gift of 
imparting a certain amount of those indulgences to 
those, who cany them or say a stated number of 
paternosters or Ave Marias before them or any special 
prayers to the Virgin or some saint, because the princi- 
ples, which gave rise to those abuses, are left to subsist. 
If the pope and the Church of which he is the head cannot 
err, Roman Catholics are wrong to say that those were 
abuses : if they admit them to have been abuses, they 
ought to give up the pretensions, which gave rise to 
them ; for by such an admission, they do away with the 
boasted infallibility, under whose sanction so many errors 
have been perpetuated. 

History will teach us that when the doctrine that 
man is justified by faith and by works had entered into 
the Church, the spiritual union of Christ with his 



SALVATION SOUGHT FROM THE CLERGY. 281 

Church, namely, with the inward man, ceased to be 
understood, and to the unity of faith which embraces 
under the same principle justification and good works 
or obedience to God's commandments, as evidence of 
faith, succeeded the notion of another kind of unity by 
the union of the external Church, or all professing 
Christians, under one head. On this new-fangled union 
alone was salvation made to depend. Then the pope 
and his priests were considered as the only channel, 
through which God's mercy could be obtained. Men 
terrified by their conscience and eager for pardon, no 
longer sought God's grace through the blood of Christ 
alone, but they looked up to the clergy, which was 
thereafter exclusively called the Church for forgiveness 
and mercy. Further, as men by meritorious works of 
their own could attain to perfection and reach a high 
degree of sane tifi cation, the belief that the merits of the 
saints, who had gone so much beyond the measure neces- 
sary for their own salvation, were applicable to the whole 
Church, was reduced into a fixed doctrine, and those 
merits were ordered to be offered up to God in behalf of 
suffering sinners both living and dead. The error did 
not stop there ; it was believed that the intercession of 
the saints with Christ was possessed of a peculiar 
efficacy. It was no longer left to the choice of indivi- 
duals to seek that intercession or to reject it. It was 
decreed that prayers addressed to them were highly 



282 



WORSHIP OF SAINTS DELUSIVE. 



beneficial, and that it was a damnable heresy to maintain 
a contrary opinion. So they were ardently invoked on 
all occasions and in all distresses of life : they became 
the special favourites, the objects of predilection and 
heartfelt devotion to a vast majority of Christians. 

One day I was telling a young man, who has become 
a convert to Ptomanism, that you had heard on the 
authority of a learned priest himself, whom we all love 
and respect, that the invocation of saints was a practice, 
which had crept into the Church. Then I added ; 

I shall not enter now into the question, how far you 
violate the law of God, who says of himself that he is a 
jealous God, in addressing prayers and supplications to 
others but himself ; yet how can the saints hear you, 
unless they be endowed with the powder of ubiquity and 
omniscience ? " — " Oh ! " said he, I do not know how 
they can hear me, but I know that they hear me ! " 
" Yes," said I, the priests have told you so ; but 
what authority have they for asserting that ? " — " I do 
not know ; but I am sure that they hear me ; and I 
know also, that it is very sweet to pray before an image 
or a crucifix !" 

Such is man ! he is easily drawn in the downward 
path, when once he has deviated from the right 
principle : and it is in religion, that this deviation is 
particularly dangerous, for it is often attended with the 
sweetest illusions, which the deluded mind takes for 
ins])iraiions of the Holy Spirit. 



CAUSES OF CONVERSION TO ROMANISM. 283 

It is not surprising that the Church of Rome should 
make some converts^ when we consider how little the 
true spirit of Christianity is really understood. Some 
seek for power and external union^ they find them 
there. Others are taken up with rites and ceremonies 
and outward forms, their feelings are there gratified. 
Others attach importance to the works of the law, 
fastings, and mortifications : the Church of Rome 
presents these to them, as the means of attaining to 
perfection. Others are drawn hy the authority of some 
writers, who flourished in those times, when they fancy 
all was pure and undefiled. They forget that these 
writers were in the very worst circumstances to preserve 
the purity of the apostolic doctrines ; for they lived in 
times, when men and things had become the objects of 
peculiar veneration and worship, when a morbid 
devotion sought after every kind of unnatural excite- 
ment, and they were surrounded by pagan or semi-pagan 
populations, which it had become the policy to allure by 
tampering with their prejudices and superstitions, in 
substituting saints and martyrs for the deities, which, 
they were wont to worship, by borrowing from the 
pagan ritual processions, incense, tapers, gorgeous 
apparel, and ceremonies, for which the Romans always 
had so strong a passion. The Roman Church has not 
only adopted all the extravagant conceptions of those 
Fathers, as well as the good instructions which they 



284 TRUE PRINCIPLES TO BE FOLLOWED. 

have left, but she has placed them among her saints, 
and she presents them to their admirers not only as 
guides, whom they are to follow, hut as intercessors, 
whom they are to invoke, and intermediate deities, 
whom they are to worship. Others are of a melancholy 
or timorous disposition. They cannot trust in those 
words of their Saviour : Come unto me, all ye that 
labour, and are heavily laden, and I will refresh you :" 
they must have men to administer them relief and 
comfort. They will find in the absolution of the priest, 
a balm that will lull the gloom of their conscience, and 
will paralyze their fears. 

In the true spirit of the Gospel man must fly to God 
alone for consolation : it is only through Jesus Christ 
that he can find mercy and justification : his own heart 
is the only altar, upon which he must worship. In the 
Roman Church he will find man everywhere substituted 
for God. It is from man that he must first obtain 
his pardon, before he can hope to receive it from God. 
It is no wonder then that this deluding system should 
attract many men to itself. But I feel deeply convinced 
that, any member of the Roman Church, who, casting 
away the prejudices which have surrounded him from 
his birth, will carefully peruse the Bible, read history 
dispassionately, take a philosophical view of the workings 
of the human mind, and who then will dare to ask 
himself this question. Is the religion which I profess. 



BOAST OF ROMAN CATHOLICS. 



285 



the religion of the Bible, such as it was delivered 
by Christ and taught by his apostles ? must come 
to the conclusion that it is not. He cannot close 
his mind to the conviction that together with the 
great truth, that Christ is the Saviour of the world, 
which is still the anchor of his hope, he has believed 
and fostered many errors. 

It is the boast of the Roman Catholics that they 
believe that which was always believed by all, and 
everywhere. Quod ubique, quod semper, quod ab 
omnibus creditum est, is our creed," say the priests to 
the people ; and the people receive it on their word, 
and repeat it to others. But bare assertions, however 
bold, ought not to satisfy an enquiring mind ; it must 
have positive and evident proofs. — Eighteen centuries 
have rolled away, since the founder of Christianity 
terminated his divine mission by opening the gates of 
heaven to all believers. Eighteen centuries ago his 
apostles had already preached the glad tidings of the 
Gospel to many repenting sinners and in many regions 
of the earth. During that lapse of time, we are not to 
stop at any period, in which we see any particular 
practice to have been followed, or such and such 
opinion to have been admitted and sanctioned : We 
must go further up, till we come to the fountain-head. 

A capital error, which has led to so many others has 
been the tendency of many members of the Church to 



286 ILLUSION CONCERNING THE FATHERS. 



regard the Fatliers, as divinely inspired. Their 
vv-ri tings have come down to us hallowed by time : and 
because they have recommended many practices and 
entertained many opinions^ which are not to be found 
in the word of God, men have followed them, as if 
those writings had been dictated by God himself. 
Whereas the Fathers had no other guide, but that 
which we possess, namely, the Inspired Writings. 
Wherever they deviate from these, we are bound not to 
follow them. This is the principle, which we should 
adopt without hesitation, with respect to any contem- 
porary writers, upon any subject. Because we look at 
the early ecclesiastical writers through the long vista of 
ages, we feel inclined to look upon them as somewhat 
more than men, we forget what they were and the 
circumstances by which they y>~ere surrounded. Many 
are admitted even by Roman Catholics to have been 
too credulous, and to have transmitted to us many 
fables and visionary legends. These fables and legends 
have been rejected, and others, which stand on no 
better authority, have been retained and believed, merely 
because they favour the practices and errors which are 
maintained and cherished at this day. 

If, as no one can deny, the worship of saints is a 
practice, v/hich has crept into the Church, there must 
have been a time, when it was not to be found in the 
Church, when Christians would have shrunk from 



VIOLATION OF THE TIRST COMMANDMENT, 287 

offering up their prayers to dead men^ with no less 
horror than they did, from invoking false deities or 
sacrificing to idols. Then what authority had those 
who introduced or sanctioned such a practice for doing 
so ? By what right did they abrogate the first com- 
mandment : " Thou shalt have no other gods but me ?" 
Does not the act of addressing prayers and supplications 
to invisible beings constitute worship, nay, and supreme 
worship too P Can any one imagine a higher degTee 
of worship of which the human mind is susceptible ? 
Therefore, if we invoke other beings than God, we 
virtually admit other gods than the Eternal Jehovah, 
who dictated this law, to be for ever the rule of men, 
even to the end of time. This single admission of 
such a practice having crept into the Church, destroys 
at once the boastful saying : Quod ubique, quod semper^ 
quod ab omnibus creditum est. 

We, who cut off all these excrescences, which had 
grown up upon our sacred faith, do most unequivocally 
and confidently subscribe to this sentence, W'hich has 
been so misapplied by those who hitherto have made it 
their boast. We fearlessly stand upon its declaration, 
and claim the use of it in its most complete sense. 

We believe in God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit^ 
and all the other articles of the apostles' creed, because 
they were always believed, everywhere and by all who 
called upon the name of Jesus, by whom they hoped to 



288 GRIEVOUS OFFENCE AGAINST GOB. 

be saved. But we do not believe that we ought to 
worship saints and angels and pray to them, because it 
was not believed in the pure days of the Church, and 
because such a w^orship is contrary to God's commands, 
and a grievous offence against him. 

We believe that in the sacrament of eucharist every 
worthy communicant receives the body and blood of 
Christ, because he has said it and we believe in his 
word. But we do not believe in transubstantiation, 
because it is contrary to the spirit of the Gospel, and 
was not taught by the apostles nor held by the primitive 
Church. We reject it, because it is a dogma, which 
has crept into the Church, and which completely alters 
the end of the holy sacrament of Christ's body and 
blood. Therefore we do not believe that in the mass 
there is a sacrifice, nor that the wafer is God after con- 
secration and ought to be worshipped, because it is a 
new invention, which gradually crept into the Church, 
and which prevailed as the original intent of this sacri- 
ficial institution came to be forgotten; because it 
completely destroys the union of the true believer with 
the Redeemer's body, atoning for sin upon the cross ; 
because it has introduced new sacrifices instead of that 
one sacrifice, which cannot be renewed ; " for this man, 
after he had offered one sacrifice for sins, for ever sat 
down on the right hand of God" — (Heb. x. 12.) 
We reject this dogma because it does not discriminate 



A NEW LAW OF MAN's INVENTION. 289 

between the human body of Christ once ofiered up for 
the expiation of sin^ and his divinity, which cannot 
suffer ; because it transforms that divinity into a piece 
of bread, to be eaten and consumed by man ; because 
it has materialized those words of Jesus, which are spirit, 
which are life. 

We reject the doctrine of purgatory and indulgences, 
because it is opposed to the doctrine of the Gospel, 
because the apostles did not teach it, nor was it held by 
the primitive Church. We object to it, because it 
substitutes a new law of man's invention to the old law, 
'^by whose deeds there shall no flesh be justified;'*- 
because it assumes that man can by his own power 
open or close heaven either to himself or to others, and 
especially because it makes imperfect the sacrifice of 
the body of Jesus Christ, who as our perpetual High 
Priest has entered the Holy of Holies, where he is set 
at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in heaven, 
and needeth not daily as those high priests to ofifer up 
sacrifice, first for his own sins, and then for the people's : 
for this he did once, when he ofiered up himself; and 
by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are 
sanctified — (Heb. vii. x.) 

We object to it, because we know that it is a merely 
Pagan notion, and that it takes its root in one of those 
superstitious traditions with which the Jews and Eastern 
heretics were infected. 

T 



290 WORKS OT SUPEREROGATION USELESS. 

We believe that good works are the evidence of faith, 
because if we love God, we shall keep his commandments: 
therefore faith cannot be separated from the works, which 
the will of God requires from us. We then believe 
with St. Paul and the primitive Church, that faith alone 
can save us, and that whatever we do, we must say that 
we are unprofitable servants. We say also with St. 
James, that faith without works is dead, or rather that 
there can be no faith without them ; and we believe that 
the first fruit of our faith is a sincere repentance towards 
God, and a godly sorrow for having ofiTended him. We 
believe that we must mortify our senses and abstain 
from all appearance of evil. But we do not believe 
that by imposing upon ourselves any kind of bodily 
pains, by wearing sackcloth, fasting, making pilgrimages, 
visiting shrines, praying before a crucifix with out- 
stretched arms, or submitting to any other kind of 
penance, either of our own suggestion, or by the com- 
mand of others, we do anything agreeable to God, and 
thereby benefit our own souls or those of others. 
Moreover, we consider it a miserable delusion to teach, 
that men who have done those things have by these acts 
advanced their own salvation and have acquired, in the 
sight of God, m^erits, which can be applied to the salva- 
tion of the souls either of the living or of the dead. We 
reject such notions, because they are in express contra- 
diction to the word of God, and were not believed by 



DUTY AND LIBERTY OF CHRISTIANS. 291 

Christians, till after spurious practices had crept into 
the Church, and the ascetic ideas of the Therapeutae 
and other Asiatic sects had prevailed in it. 

We believe with all sound and true Christians that it 
is incumbent on every man to mortify the flesh and 
to curb the passions, that war against the soul. But we 
do not believe that any man has a right to prescribe the 
means to be employed to obtain that end, and to tell us 
that we incur the pain of sin and damnation, if we 
refuse to follow his prescriptions, because he thereby 
puts himself in the place of God. We listen to the 
words of St. Paul, who bids us to stand fast in the 
liberty wherewith Christ has made us free, and be not 
entangled again in the yoke of bondage. For in 
Jesus Christ neither circumcision availeth anything, 
nor uncircumcision : but faith, which worketh by love. 
We then believe that no man has dominion over our 
faith ; for we have not received the spirit of bondage 
again to fear ; but we have received the spirit of 
adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father" — (Rom. viii.) 
Wherefore being no more servants, but sons ; and if 
sons, then heirs of God through Christ, we cannot 
without incurring the guilt of heresy and disobedience to 
God's law, do service unto them which by nature are not 
gods, nor turn again to the weak and beggarly elements, 
whereunto we or our fathers were in bondage, for by so 
doing we should prefer the commandments and 
doctrines of men to those of God. 



292 THE CHILDREN OE GOD. 

We believe that there is one Lord^ one faith, and 
one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above 
all, and through all, and in all, because Scripture teaches 
it to us and this was always believed, everywhere and 
by all, who were the children of God by faith in Christ 
Jesus — (Gal. iii. 26.) We have faith in these words of 
our Saviour : Whosoever shall confess me before men, 
him will I confess also before my Father, which is in 
heaven" — (Mat. x. 32.) Therefore we believe that 
the Church of Christ consists of all those, who in every 
country and at all times, confess him to be the Son of 
God, who being in the form of God, thought it no 
robbery to be equal with God," and have faith in him 
and hope in him as their only Mediator and Saviour. 
St. John tells us that, whosoever shall confess that 
Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him and he 
in God." And St. Paul says : "Ye are all children of 
God, by faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as 
have been baptized into Christ, have put on Christ" — 
(Gal. iii. 27.) This unity of the faith is the rock upon 
which the Church is built, Jesus Christ himself being 
the chief corner-stone. 

We believe with the primitive Church these words 
addressed by St. Peter to all the elect: "Ye also as 
living stones, are built up a spiritual house, an 
holy priesthood to offer up spiritual sacrifices, accept- 
able to God by Jesus Christ. Wherefore also it is 



CHRIST THE ONLY HEAD OF THE CHURCH, 293 

contained in the Scripture, Behold, I lay in Zion a 
chief corner-stone, elect, precious : and he that believeth 
on him shall not he confounded" — (1 Peter ii.) — We 
believe then that all the elect, all those that are built up 
a spiritual house in Christ are the true and living Church, 
the everlasting Church, of which Christ is the head and 
chief corner-stone. But we do not believe that St. Peter 
ever thought, that he was himself the head of the 
Church, and that those, who refused to acknowledge him 
as such or the bishop of Rome, as his lawful successor, 
could not be saved, though they believed on the chief 
corner-stone, elect, precious, on whom he says he that 
believeth, shall not be confounded. Neither do we 
believe that the apostles had any idea that Peter w^as the 
head, to whom all were to submit under pain of damna- 
tion : for we see that even on the eve of their divine 
master s passion, there was strife among them, which 
of them should be accounted the greatest" — (Luke xxii. 
24.) We refuse to believe such a doctrine, because it 
is contrary to Scripture, because it virtually does away 
with faith in Christ, which becomes useless without faith 
also in Peter, or rather in the pope, and because it was 
not always believed : for it was not believed by the 
primitive Church who considered that all the apostles 
were endowed with the same authority and had equally 
received the power of the keys, that is the power of 
preaching salvation, of which the keys were an emblem. 



294 THE TRUE WAY OF VENERATING THE SAINTS. 

Then if the bishop of Rome was really the successor of 
Peter in his see, he would not derive from that succession 
any title to be the head of the Church. Therefore we do 
not believe, that it is necessary to be in conjunction with 
the Church of Rome and acknowledge the pope as 
sovereign pontiff over the Church of Christ in order to 
be saved, because it was not always believed by all 
and everywhere, and because it is assigning to a man an 
authority and a privilege which belong to Christ alone. 

We do not believe the Church of Rome to be infalli- 
ble any more than the pope, because, as there have been 
popes, who were most corrupt, and a disgrace to human 
nature, so the Church has been in process of time cor- 
rupted by all kinds of human inventions ; the grossest 
superstitions, the greatest contradictions have prevailed 
at various times in her bosom, and she still holds practices 
and teaches doctrines, contrary to the word of God, 
which are the offspring of misguided superstition or the 
remnants of ancient pagan rites and customs. 

We do not contemn the saints and martyrs, though 
we do not consecrate and worship their bones nor have 
any faith in the pretended miracles, which these are 
supposed to perform. We do not pray to them nor 
worship them, because we know that they were only 
men, sinners as we are, whom their faith in the divine 
Redeemer of mankind could alone justify in the sight of 
God. But we venerate them, we honour them in the 



TRUST IN CHRIST. 295 

only way which is worthy of them and can be acceptable 
to God, by thanking him for all the mercies which he 
has been pleased to bestow upon them, and earnestly 
praying to him that he may be pleased to grant us to 
love and serve him as they did, and to rest all our hope 
of salvation in our common Mediator and Saviour, Jesus 
Christ. Wherefore seeing we also are compassed 
about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside 
every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset 
us, and let us run with patience the race that is set 
before us. Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher 
of our faith ; who for the joy that was set before him 
endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down 
at the right hand of the throne of God" — (Heb. xii.) 
He is the rock upon which his Church is built. Moored 
to that rock of safety, let us not be afraid, my dear 
children, of the tempests which may assail us. Let us 
have faith in his promises, let us receive him as a Saviour, 
let us cast our burden upon him, he will support us 
through the dangers and temptations of this life, and 
bring us safe to those heavenly mansions, where he sits 
at the right hand of God, and where they, that have been 
faithful to the end, will receive the crown of life and 
enjoy the presence of God throughout a blissful eternity. 



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